Reconstruction
by L. Mouse
Summary: In the end, all they could save was his spark. In the end, perhaps that was for the best. Now, a youngling with the spark of a beloved leader must find his way even as Cybertron itself struggles to survive. (A May/December romance, slow build, and continuity fusion.)
1. Chapter 1

Author's note: The kid is not an OC.

* * *

"It's very large."

Wheeljack grinned behind his blast mask at Resonance's reaction to his first view of Iacon. The kid peered through the shuttle's window, expression awestruck. His wings were hiked up with interest, and his blue optics bright.

In truth, Wheeljack felt a little of that reaction himself. He hadn't been home to Cybertron in fifty vorns. The last time he'd seen Iacon, it had been a blasted ruin of a city. Now, tall buildings rose again above the plains, and the rubble was gone. Fliers filled the air and the streets were full of people.

"Don't forget what we talked about. It's important that nobody looks at you too closely." Wheeljack reminded, gently, resting a hand on the kid's shoulder. He had to reach up to do so. Resonance, though young, was quite tall for an airframe. His gangly frame promised more growth yet, and he hadn't even begun to fill out. He was technically close to his majority at twenty vorns of age, but like many very large mecha, he was was slow to physically mature.

"I remember," Resonance said, calm and confident. "I understand the importance."

Wheeljack sighed. He was worried, though he told himself he shouldn't be. Resonance was a responsible and serious youngling, not at all prone to acting without thinking. Even if the worst happened, and Resonance's secrets were found out, it would not be a disaster. It would simply be unfortunate for Resonance, who didn't deserve the drama and political theater that would follow.

After a few minutes more of flight, the shuttle touched down at the skyport. Wheeljack and Resonance departed amid a small crowd of other mecha. They waited patiently in the queue for customs. Resonance looked about alertly, likely fascinated by - well, everything. He'd spent most of his life on a small moonlet, and this was the first time he'd ever been to Cybertron.

The customs mech was a small, tired-looking yellow minibot. The little mech didn't even look up as Wheeljack approached the desk. "Designation?"

"Wheeljack." He said this with a merry flash of his earfins.

The minibot looked up, sharply. "Wheeljack!"

"Hello, Bumblebee."

'Bee rose from his seat, hurried around the desk, and threw his arms around Wheeljack's waist. "Jackie, welcome home!"

He returned the hug firmly. Bumblebee was a good mech, and someone he had missed. "So they've got you working customs, eh?"

Bumblebee shrugged after releasing the inventor. "I think it's because I know everyone and all their tricks. Speaking of which -" he surveyed Wheeljack head to toe with a suspicious look that was a sharp reminder that 'Bee had been one of Jazz's operatives once upon a time, "- anything explosive, dangerous, experimental, or reality-altering that I need to know about?"

"No!" Wheeljack held his hands up, palms out, in a show of submission. "Nothing, nada. Honest. I've got the kid with me. I'll risk my plating, but not his."

"Kid?" Bumblebee's gaze moved, for the first time, to the tall and metallic red flightframe next to Wheeljack. Resonance was watching them with curiosity, but hadn't said a word.

"Yeah, this's Res. Resonance. I found him in stasis when he was a sparkling, in a lab on a Primus-forsaken moon. He's been with me every since."

"You've got a another kid." Bumblebee said, with a giggle of delight.

"Not much of a kid anymore." Wheeljack turned to glance at Resonance. "I remember when I could carry him around. If he grows much taller, he's going to be carrying me."

Bumblebee laughed. Resonance smiled, flashing even white denta.

"Res, I fought in the war with 'Bee. He's good people." Wheeljack clapped Bumblebee on the shoulder. "I'm sure he'll point us in the right direction."

"I imagine," Bumblebee said, "you've got some immigrations issues with the kid."

"Yep. He's not in any registry - I've even checked by spark resonance. My best guess is that he was kidnapped from his parents and was destined to be one of Shockwave's experiments. He was in stasis for a few hundred thousand vorns."

So many lies in that statement. So much misdirection. Resonance was not a primally created mech, though he'd been decanted young enough to have significant natural growth left. There hadn't been time to grow his frame to full maturity in a vat, nor any easy way to smuggle such a large mech off Earth. Wheeljack had ran with Resonance when he was still small enough to fit in Wheeljack's subspace.

Bee's optics softened with sympathy. "Yes, that would explain why he isn't in the registries. Let me talk to the boss - I'll see what we can do for him."

"The boss?"

"Rodimus. Our population is still so small that he still handles many administrative issues personally."

"That's convenient. Optimus would be proud of him for that, too. So - How's Roddy doing, anyway?"

Bee's smile softened. "We're all proud of him. I'm sure he'll be pleased to see you."

* * *

Fifteen minutes later, after Bumblebee had finished processing the other arrivals, the three of them walked the short distance to the Prime's offices.

Rodimus and his officers had claimed a late noble's former mansion as their headquarters. It was not much of an extravagance. The building was large, but it was the home of the entire Cybertronian government. The building had been rebuilt into offices and was crowded and busy. Wheeljack kept a close eye on Res as they entered.

Only about half of what he had told Bee was true. The rest was a carefully constructed lie, and not even Resonance knew the entire truth about Resonance's past. However, importantly, Res had grown up on a remote moon, deliberately kept out of sight by Wheeljack and the handful of others who knew his secret. He'd never been around strangers before. Wheeljack wasn't entirely sure how he would react to a busy, bustling office full of glitchy former Autobots and Decepticons. Resonance was about as laid back a mech as was ever created, but he was still young and this was an entirely new experience for him.

"WheeljackWheeljackWheeljackwheredidyoucomefrom!"

"Hi, kid." Wheeljack said, bemused, as Blurr shot out from an open office door. The young courier had grown a head in height since Wheeljack had seen him last, but he was every bit as hyper as Jackie remembered.

"Wheeljack!" Perceptor said, popping out of another doorway. Skyfire ducked out after him, followed by Grapple. Even as Blurr tackled Wheeljack in a hug, the others converged on him. "When did you get here?"

"Just a few klicks ago."

"What brings you to Cybertron?" Skyfire asked, as Percy hugged Wheeljack after Blurr let go.

Over Perceptor's shoulder, Wheeljack said, "Eh, it was time for the kid t'meet more people. I'm hoping to get him enrolled in the university."

Several sets of optics - more mecha had arrived, drawn by the commotion - all shifted to Resonance. Resonance, true to his personality, didn't react with anything worse than a bit of tension in his stance. However, he summoned a bright smile and said, "Hi."

"Kid?Youhaveanewkid?Whendidthishappen?" Blurr demanded.

"About twenty vorns ago." Wheeljack reached back - and up, because Resonance was so blasted tall - and pulled him forward by his arm. "Resonance, meet Blurr, Perceptor, Grapple, Skyfire - ah, hi Jazz!" The former Autobot TIC had arrived from a side corridor, a bright smile on his face that revealed nothing of Jazz's mood, "Silverbolt, uh, Thundercracker and Skywarp, Sunstreaker, uh ..."

"I apologize if I fail to keep your designations straight," Resonance said, now looking a bit overwhelmed as more mecha kept appearing. There were now more people in one place than the sum total that Resonance had seen in his life. Wheeljack had told Res stories about many of these mecha, but that didn't mean he knew them personally. Quite a few had changed their alts, and therefore their appearance, since the end of the war.

"Wheeljack!" An excited voice crowed, louder and deeper in tone than the general hubbub.

"Swoop!" Wheeljack held his arm wide.

The dinobot broke into a run, scattering the converging crowd. He folded his creator into an enthusiastic hug, actually picking him up and spinning him around.

Wheeljack pounded Swoop's back enthusiastically, and let himself be manhandled. By Dinobot standards, this was good manners. After a moment, Swoop set him back down. "Wheeljack, you could have told me you were coming home!"

Was Cybertron actually home anymore? He wasn't even sure. "I wanted it to be a surprise!" he said, which was true. Sort've.

Swoop, he thought, looked good. The past twenty vorns of peace had allowed the young pre-prog to mature, that much was clear. His speech was far less glitched than it had been, and his optics alert and calm. Wheeljack couldn't wait to see the rest of the Dinobots.

"Jackie!" And there were more of his creations here. He'd seen Silverbolt at the back of the crowd, though 'Bolt was hanging back with his usual reserve. Fireflight, by contrast, launched into Wheeljack's arms. Wheeljack hugged him with an enthusiastic crow of delight.

"It's good to see all of you." Wheeljack said, when the tide of new arrivals slowed.

"So I have a new brother," Silverbolt said, with a smile. "Welcome home, creator. Resonance, welcome to Cybertron. And Wheeljack, I thought you said you weren't going to create any more flight frames after the five of us!"

Wheeljack laughed at Silverbolt's gentle teasing. The Dinobots might have been more notorious with the rest of the Autobots when they were younglings, but from the standpoint of a legal guardian and creator, the Aerialbots had given Wheeljack far more nightmares. The Dinobots had generally been restricted to localized mayhem due to the limitations of their frame types. The Aerialbots, from the day their protoforms been imbued with sparks by Vector Sigma, had been frighteningly mobile. It was very hard to protect, teach, or rein in younglings when they could reach the opposite side of a good sized planet before he'd even noticed they were missing.

"He's not my creation," Wheeljack said, gently. "But I've raised him as my own. I found him in one of Shockwave's labs, after the war. So yes, you have a new brother."

Resonance held his hand out for a human-style handshake to Silverbolt. "It's good to meet you. And you, Swoop. And Fireflight. And - you are First Aid, correct?"

First Aid was another of Wheeljack's creations. He'd made so many, during the war. So many had been deactivated, too, at ages that were far too young. He'd hated sending young pre-progs sparked by Vector Sigma into war when they were still legally sparklings, though critical need had required it. However, through sheer, pure, luck, almost all the mecha he'd built on Earth had survived. Earth had been good to his children.

"Welcome to Cybertron, Resonance," First Aid said smoothly.

Unlike the others, First Aid knew Resonance's secret. So did Ratchet. The cranky old doctor was leaning one shoulder against a door frame leading to a conference room, and watching the proceedings with a sharp gaze. Ratchet finally commed him, using an old encrypted Autobot frequency. :He looks good. Wish you'd warned us you were coming, though.:

:If I had, someone probably would have said 'no'.: Wheeljack shrugged. :Kid was bored out of his mind on Titan. It'll be fine, Ratchet. You'll see.:

:Hnnh.:

"What," a mech with a smooth voice and a flashy paint job demanded, "Is going on here?"

The owner of the voice couldn't see Wheeljack, who was currently being hugged by Sideswipe and Sunstreaker. Wheeljack, however, recognized the voice immediately. He wriggled free of the embrace and came to a proud parade rest.

"Just your usual Wheeljack-inspired chaos," Ratchet said, drily, in a voice that carried over the noise.

"Wheeljack?" Rodimus Prime strode through the crowd, which parted before him. Ultra Magnus followed closely on his heels. "This is a surprise."

"Everyone back to work. You can socialize when your shifts are over!" Magnus barked, causing the crowd to evaporate with surprising speed.

Bumblebee's plating flattened a bit in reaction to Ultra Magnus's voice tone, but he said, "Jackie needs to speak to Rodimus. The kid needs his immigration paperwork sorted out."

Ratchet, who had not fled Magnus's wrath like the others, straightened up._ :Does he know?:_

_:I've never told Rodimus anything other than the cover story, so if you haven't ...?:_

_:Nope. And I don't intend to. This should be interesting.:_

Rodimus Prime led the way to his office, which was on the top floor of the five-story building. The office's windows had an expansive view of the Iacon University grounds, and beyond them, new apartment buildings and small factories and warehouses.

"Welcome home," Rodimus said, to Wheeljack. "I hope you're planning on staying for awhile."

"Yeah, for a bit. Might try to get work at the university."

"If you promise not to blow it up," Rodimus said, amusement in his voice, "that could be arranged. There's an opening for an anatomical engineering professor in the science department that should suit you well - you will need to work with Starscream, but he's actually mellowed out a bit."

Wheeljack shrugged. "Screamer's not that bad. We got along before the war, I imagine we can get along after it."

"Heh. And Ratchet will thank me for lightening his workload."

Ratchet, leaning against the back wall of Rodimus's office, grunted agreement.

"So. You have a ... youngling. What's the story here?"

Wheeljack glanced over at Resonance. "Ah, you know Titan, right? A large moon in Earth's system? I was contracted by the humans to help them study it, after the war. It's an interesting world - Percy would love it. Anyway, we found one of Shockwave's labs, abandoned, during the survey. As best we can tell, Res was a primally created sparkling, most likely stolen from his parents at birth. He was either kidnapped, or, well, you know what Shockwave was like. I wouldn't be surprised if his progenitor was dead, but I don't have any proof."

Rodimus made a distressed noise.

Wheeljack sighed. "He was in stasis in a storage vat. I pulled him out, thinking he was a symbiont until I got a good look at him. I don't think his processors had ever booted before. And the rest is history - he's been tagging along with me every since."

There were so many lies in that brief explanation. Wheeljack didn't feel the least bit guilty about telling them. Fortunately, Rodimus lacked Optimus's nigh supernatural ability to spot falsehoods. It was best if Rodimus never, ever, knew Resonance's secrets. It would be bad for Roddy, and bad for Cybertron, and terrible for Resonance, if the truth was known.

Not even Resonance knew all of Resonance's secrets. Wheeljack intended to keep it that way. For everyone's sake, but most especially Resonance's.

"Ah. You didn't see fit to bring him to Cybertron before now? It must have been hard for a youngling, growing up out on the frontier ..." Rodimus's optics narrowed.

Wheeljack shrugged. "I wasn't sure if the peace was going to hold. I was tired of sending younglings off to war. Call it selfish, but I wanted to make sure at least one of my kids didn't end up either being killed, or killing someone, before their first vorn of existence."

"Understandable, I suppose," Rodimus said, with a weary sigh. Hot Rod had been created during the war, though not by Wheeljack. Like most of his generation of pre-progs, he would bear the scars on his spark until he died. He'd never had a childhood, and had been sent to war within a few earth weeks of onlining. Rodimus was also the first pre-prog in the history of Cybetron to become a Prime. He was living proof that, unlike what many primally created mecha believed, pre-progs were not inferior.

"I can confirm Wheeljack's story," Ratchet said, mildly. "He called me for advice when he found the kid. I talked about it with Jazz, just in case there was anything Ops knew about that installation. All Jazz could tell me was that Shockwave used that lab to design experimental warframes."

"Hnnh." Rodimus regarded Resonance. "And you verified his spark frequency's not on file?"

"Nope. Already checked." Ratchet put in, tone casual. "He was so young when Jackie found him, they probably never scanned it in before Shockwave got his claws on him - assuming the kid wasn't born in a lab somewhere."

Wheeljack wished they weren't having this discussion in front of Res. He glanced back. Resonance had no expression discernible on his rugged features.

That Res's spark frequence wasn't on file was a lie, but Rodimus was no medic nor scientist and was vanishingly unlikely to insist on independent confirmation. Besides which, Jazz had altered a few key medical records in the Autobot databases. Someone with ample time and sufficient clearance might dig the truth up, but Wheeljack was counting on most mecha accepting Resonance at face value. He wasn't the only sparkling to be plucked from a Decepticon vat and raised by sympathetic Autobots after the war. Not by a long shot.

"So." Rodimus turned his attention on Resonance. "What do you want to do with your life, kid?"

Resonance blinked, then answered with his usual calm thoughtfulness, "For now, I simply wish to attend the university and take a core classes and a few electives. Wheeljack has suggested I study a range of subjects, and this seems sensible. I am not certain what career I wish to focus on yet."

"Anything in particular interest you?"

"Medicine." Resonance said, promptly. "And history. And ... art."

None of those answers surprised Wheeljack. Resonance's love of art had been a bit unexpected, but on reflection, it shouldn't have been. The interest in medicine came from a spark-deep sense of compassion. That Resonance would be strikingly intelligent and academically oriented was also an easy assumption.

"He's got the mind for medicine, too," Ratchet said. "Wheeljack's showed me some of the kid's lessons. He's doing work way ahead of his age. He shouldn't have a problem with the admissions tests, and he can use me as a reference."

Rodimus flashed Resonance a grin, clearly having reached a decision. "Welcome to Iacon, Resonance. I'll have your residency permit done by this afternoon."

* * *

Later - much later - Wheeljack knocked on Ratchet's apartment door.

The medic let him in quickly.

"Where's the kid?" Ratchet demanded, optics narrowing.

Wheeljack held his hands up defensively. "Hey, he's twenty vorns old. He can be trusted not to burn the hotel room down if I leave him alone for a few hours."

Ratchet huffed. "I suppose."

"Ratchet," Wheeljack said, following the medic inside, "I know you want to protect him - and that you'd rather not actually see him - but he's grown up. He's not a sparkling anymore. I couldn't keep him alone on that moon anymore. It just wasn't fair. He deserves a chance to live a real life. Like we agreed, you know?"

Another huff. "I know. It's just hard."

"Tell me about it." Wheeljack glanced behind him, making sure the door was shut tight. "The older he gets, the more he reminds me of Optimus. He's - he's got potential, Ratchet. I brought him home not just for his sake, but for all of ours."

"No!" Ratchet snapped, visibly bristling. "Wheeljack, no. He gave everything for us, and in the end all I could save was his spark!

Wheeljack snorted. "I wasn't suggesting he petition Rodimus for a return of the Matrix. Pit no. Over my dead and rusted corpse! But - but he deserves a chance to be anything he wants to be. Anything at all. And Cybertron will be better for it, no matter what that is. That's just the way he is."

Ratchet settled, a bit, armor relaxing.

"You gonna be okay with him here?" Wheeljack regarded his old friend with softening optics. "I know it's going to be hard on you. Particularly when you see how much he's like Optimus."

"Yeah." Ratchet folded his arms across his chest. Something like defiance blazed in his optics as he insisted, "Yeah, I'll be fine."


	2. Chapter 2

Reconstruction

* * *

Chapter 2

* * *

The Iacon University dean was the largest mech that Resonance had ever met except for the one he saw in his own mirror every morning. He, too, was a shuttle, with gleaming white paint, upswept wings, and a serious face that was occasionally warmed by a smile. Most mecha would not have met the dean when enrolling, but Skyfire and Wheeljack were old war buddies. When Wheeljack had entered the university's enrollment office, Skyfire had coincidentally been walking through, and he had greeted Wheeljack with a firm handshake and a quick grin.

"Your placement test results were very good," Skyfire said, after personally reviewing Resonance's application. "It appears that the only area you will need to catch up in is in combat skills. I know we are at peace, but all students are required to attain a basic minimum level of competence in martial arts, marksmanship, and military protocols. As a flight frame, you will also be required to learn air combat skills and pass a flight skills test."

Resonance nodded understanding. "From my study of Cybertron's political situation, I doubt that we are at much risk of another civil war -"

"Not enough mecha left to fight one, for starters," Wheeljack growled.

"- but we are vulnerable to attack from outside forces. Quintessons, and other galactics, are not our friends and we are currently weak a potentially attractive target. I have no objection to learning combat skills, though I pray I will never need to use them."

Skyfire nodded. "Your application indicated you _have _studied a bit of hand to hand under Wheeljack, and that Jazz, Blaster, and a few other Autobots have tutored you when you met with them."

"I have learned what I can. I'm afraid fighting is just not a skill that comes naturally to me." Resonance shrugged. It wasn't for lack of trying on his part.

Wheeljack nodded agreement. "And as far as flying goes - he's never met another flight frame before in his life. The first time he went up in the air as a sparkling, a human was in his pilot's seat just in case he got in trouble. Since he's gotten big enough to carry me, I've taught him what I know - as you know, I'm a licensed pilot - but I'm also a grounder. I think he's got the basics down, but he's definitely no Starscream. -So, anyway, who teaches the flight classes?"

"Starscream."

"I should have guessed." Wheeljack rolled his optics.

"He's not as obnoxious as he used to be." Skyfire said, tone amused. "He might be able to fly circles around me in the air, but I can kick his scrawny aft from here to next week on the ground. However, he actually loves teaching, and for the right reasons. I very seldom have to pull a Megatron on him."

Wheeljack started laughing at the "kick his scrawny aft" comment and by the time Skyfire was done, he was practically doubled over, headfins flashing brightly with genuine amusement. A couple of university staffers, discretely listening in, grinned or snickered quietly from their nearby desks.

"Don't worry," Skyfire waved casually in Resonance's direction. "He'll be nice to the kid. Resonance is Starscream's type."

Resonance, mortified, said over the sound of Wheeljack's choking laughter, "I would _never _expect to be treated differently because he likes my frame type!"

Wheeljack just kept chortling. Resonance did _not _understand what was so funny, and stared at his guardian with dismay.

Skyfire simply ignored Wheeljack and said, "Introductory Air Combat is obligatory, and Starscream has a slot open. You indicated an interest in medicine, so we can put you with Ratchet ..."

Wheeljack finally struggled his way to coherency. "No-no offense, Skyfire, but d-does First Aid have a spot open for Intro to Emergency Medicine? That'd be a good starting point for him, and if we do end up squabbling with the Quints, that would give Res a useful skill set. I want to keep him from being flying cannon fodder."

"There's a prereq of Basic Cybertronian Anatomy and also Intro to Structural Engineering ..." Skyfire objected, though he didn't sound particularly determined.

"He's my kid." Wheeljack said, firmly. "He's helped me with structural engineering since he was knee high. You saw his test results. He can handle it, and frankly, as much as I love Ratch, I ... well. You know what he's like. I'd hate to have to kill the good doctor because he made my kid cry."

Skyfire snorted. "Yeah, I can see that."

"I would _not _cry!" Resonance objected, vaguely offended.

Both adults ignored him, but Skyfire entered him into the Emergency Medicine class.

Wheeljack peered over Skyfire's shoulder as Skyfire scrolled through the classes that still had openings. He said, "I'd like him to carry a light load for his first semester ... give him time to get used to living with other mechs. And he's young, he should get a chance to check out the social scene, have some fun. How about - Cybertronian Lit 101 with Kup?"

"Done." Skyfire tapped the screen a few times. "And, uh, what about something artistic?"

Resonance said gravely, "I am not much of an artist."

"... claims the kid who designed his own paint scheme," Wheeljack said, as he reached up and flicked the tip of one of Resonance's metallic red wings with a finger.

Resonance lifted his wing out of Wheeljack's reach and shot his guardian a dark look. "I happen to like red."

"And gold. And any other bright color. He wanted blue flames."

"Well, flames do work for Rodimus," Skyfire observed, with a small shrug.

"... not _blue _flames on _red _armor." Wheeljack said. "Not with his height and his voice."

"Oh. Indeed. I see your point." Skyfire tried to keep a straight face, failed miserably, and finally laughed.

Resonance, who never liked being the butt of anyone's joke, folded his arms across his chest and announced, "As soon as I reach my majority, I am _getting _flames."

"Just ... not blue." Wheeljack clapped his hands over his optics in mock horror. "You'll look like a winged version of Optimus Prime and everyone will stare. It would be sacrilegious."

"Gold, then." He certainly didn't want to be stared at. He and Wheeljack had this discussion before, however, and he failed to see why people would see any resemblance between them. Optimus Prime had been a convoy class heavy transport, heavily modified for combat. Resonance was a large flight frame, with only basic armor and no weapons.

"Fine, gold. When you're old enough that I can't stop you _and _you have the money to pay for it yourself. Primus." Wheeljack scrubbed at his face with his hands. "And I believe this discussion is truly proof that Resonance has zero artistic sensibility."

"And I believe I should now be offended." Resonance folded his arms across his chest and glowered down at his guardian. He wasn't actually offended, but this was an old joke between him and his guardian. It felt good to fall back on familiar banter in this unfamiliar world.

"And I don't care." Wheeljack grinned back up at him. That, too, was familiar.

Skyfire said, "Ahem. Wheeljack, I have missed you. - Resonance, there aren't a lot of other classes with openings, but we do have an internship in the archives that you can get credits for."

"Oh, that's perfect," Wheeljack nodded approvingly.

"What would I be doing?" Resonance said, intrigued. He loved books, and anything related to them.

"Mostly conservation work - cataloguing and restoring old texts. You would likely do some field work, too, retrieving files or hard copies from libraries that were damaged during the war."

"Sounds interesting."

"You'll enjoy it." Wheeljack gave his ward a fond smile.

Skyfire made several swift entries in the terminal, then toggled to a new page. "So - is he going to stay with you, Jackie?"

"I've got an apartment on campus, but I think Res is more than old enough and responsible enough to live on his own. It's time he had a bit of independence and met other students his age. I was hoping to get him a room in one of the residence halls. Money's not an issue, but the socialization would be good for him."

Skyfire sighed. "I wish you'd gotten here a few vorns ago. Most of the rooms are full, including all of the singles. There's a handful of doubles with an opening ... let's see. Ack, no, we can't put him with Harmonic, he's bigger than Resonance and they just wouldn't physically _fit _in the same room without denting each other. Starscream's kid is a brat - I wouldn't wish him on my worst enemy, and I certainly wouldn't inflict him on Resonance. Err. Sure you don't want him to stay with you for the first semester?"

Wheeljack frowned. "There's no other open rooms?"

"Well ... there is one option." Skyfire sighed. "He's had problem in the past, and we were going to let him have a double to himself this semester, on the quiet."

"Problems?" Wheeljack said, suspiciously.

"_Not _his fault. Anodyne's a good kid. He's just a carrier, and Anodyne tolerates bullying about as well as most carriers do, particularly where his symbionts are concerned. He's had a rough go of it."

Wheeljack said, optics lighting up with comprehension. "Yes, that could be a problem. Humans have a saying: 'Don't mess with the mama.' I think our version should be 'Don't mess with the carrier.'"

"How many symbionts does he have?" Resonance asked, remembering Blaster's - he'd had his two mechlings and Steeljaw with him when they'd met.

"Two, though it might be four, shortly. They're well behaved, they don't take up much room and they're all good mecha. Honestly, if you don't have a problem sharing a room with a carrier ..."

"I don't," Resonance interjected, firmly.

"And one of the symbionts is also very highly empathic ..."

"That will not be an issue," Resonance insisted.

"... then Anodyne might work well as your roommate. He and his symbionts really are responsible and decent mecha, and," Skyfire nodded at Wheeljack, "they'll look out for Resonance."

"Sounds perfect." Wheeljack glanced over at Resonance. "What do you think, Res?"

"I am looking forward to meeting new mecha." Resonance shrugged. Perhaps he would make some new friends. And if it didn't work out, there _was _always Wheeljack's couch. However, he was looking forward to a bit of independence and to meeting more of his own kind. This seemed like a promising start.

* * *

Anodyne walked through his dorm room's door, and then stopped short. Alarm thrilled through his circuits at the sight of a stranger in the room. Last semester, he'd been attacked in his own quarters twice.

Primus slag it, he was _certain _this year would be better. After all, he'd beaten his enemies into the ground enough times by now that nobody sane should want to mess with him. Also, the university's administration had promised death preceded by dismemberment for anyone who tried bullying him this year.

"Oh, hi." The stranger said, with a disarmingly bright smile. "I am your roommate."

The strange young mech had clearly claimed the right-hand berth. Half a dozen crates and boxes were piled upon said berth. Anodyne relaxed, a bit, realizing that a mech bent on assaulting him would not have brought luggage along.

The mech was flight frame and he had the brightest paint Anodyne had ever seen short of Rodimus Prime. He was metallic red, with the struts under his armor painted gold, and amber biolights illuminating his wings. His thrusters and hands were matte black, and his optics a brilliant electric blue. However, behind the bling, everything about his frame indicated extremely high quality construction.

The flier said, brightly, "You must be Anodyne. Sorry to surprise you."

Anodyne blurted out, "They told me I wasn't going to have a roommate this year."

"I'm sorry?" The kid said, his tone making it a question. His optics were suddenly sharp with worry, and his wings hiked up just a fraction.

"Carrier and all." Anodyne indicated his own boxy brown and black frame. "Nobody wants to room with me."

"That's a silly reason for not wanting to room with someone. A good reason would be if you had a bad temper. Or were messy. Or you have glitchmice. You're don't, do you?"

The other's tone was sarcastic and teasing all at once.

Anodyne replied, with relief flooding his system, "I'm housebroken and vermin free, I promise."

"That's good to know." The flier said, briskly, a bright smile replacing his look of mock concern. "I'm Resonance, by the way. I am very sorry that they surprised you with a roommate when you weren't expecting one. I just arrived here a few days ago, and I enrolled late."

"You ... did you _know _ they were rooming you with a carrier?" Anodyne tried not to sound prickly, and failed.

"It was mentioned. The dean suggested I'd be a good fit as your roommate." Resonance shrugged with both his wings and his shoulders. "You don't have a problem with rooming with me, do you?"

"Uh - no." Anodyne blinked rapidly. "You know it's not just me, I have a couple symbionts, right?"

He could feel his symbionts approaching at a run. They'd felt his thrill of alarm. He sent soothing feelings their way, not wanting them to create a disruption by bolting headlong through the residence hall's corridors.

"They told me that. The symbionts don't bother me, but why did they say you didn't have a roommate when you have two symbionts with you?" Resonance asked, sounding genuinely curious. "Not that I mind. I'm used to being around smaller people - I grew up on a base full of humans."

Anodyne snorted. "Because they're _symbionts_. They don't count for anything as far as most people are concerned."

The mech's casual mention of being raised around humans _was _a relief. Anodyne assumed that meant Resonance was used to watching where he stepped. The flier was huge.

"Well," Resonance said, tone mildly disapproving, "At least you don't have to pay room and board for three mechs."

"Oh, believe me, they tried. I had to appeal _that _all the way up to Skyfire. He, at least, agreed with me and changed the policy." He couldn't keep the bitterness out of his voice. "Last year, they tried to charge us tuition and board for three, even though they were treating us as a single occupant for rooming purposes _and _my mechlings are only being allowed to audit the classes. They aren't actually being graded and they won't get a degree."

"That is quite unfair!"

"Very little in life is, I've learned. - So, Resonance, where are you from? I have never seen you around before." He would have remembered a metallic red and gold shuttle sized flight frame.

"Titan. It's a moon in Earth's system. I was - I was raised there by my guardian. We traveled a bit around the frontier worlds too, but this is my first time on Cybertron."

"Ah. Explains why you were raised around humans. I'm hoping to get work on Earth when I graduate." Anything, he thought, was better than remaining on Cybertron.

"It's a beautiful world."

"You've been there?"

"Quite often. My guardian has friends there, and he worked for a human corporation when he was decommissioned after the war. He's an engineer."

"Lucky you. How are you liking Cybertron?"

"I find it sparsely populated." Resonance said, tone curiously wry. "I think my guardian is very worried I will be overwhelmed by the number of Cybertronians. The reality is, there are more humans on Titan than there are mechs on all of Cybertron, and they're all jammed into a handful of domes and a few space stations. Earth itself _teems _with humans. Here - there's plenty of room, lots of open space, and very few crowds."

At that moment, the room's door slid open and his symbionts entered. They were a daintily built mechling and rather large - if still young - cybercat. They were followed by a much larger and far older biped. All three stopped short. The younger two symbionts gave Anodyne a questioning look, both sending him wordless inquiries about the stranger. The older mechling simply folded his arms across his chest and regarded Resonance with a frown. Slamdance wasn't yet Anodyne's, but it wasn't difficult for Anodyne to tell that Slamdance was suspicious.

"Guys, this is Resonance. He's our new roommate." Anodyne gestured at the symbionts for Resonance's benefit. "Resonance, the cybercat is Scout, and the shrimp there is Agility."

Agility gave him a _look _full of silent, wounded, offense at being called a _shrimp_. Anodyne responded with equally silent amusement. If Agility was ticked off about being teased, he wasn't worrying himself into a bundle of sparking circuits over the presence of a stranger in their room.

"And we're Slamdance." The bigger mechling introduced himself, or rather, _them_self, to Resonance.

Resonance frowned briefly, clearly puzzled. "You were Blaster's during the war ... I'm sorry. I'm being rude. I don't mean to pry."

"Blaster's still an Autobot." Slamdance said, easily. "We just had enough of the military life. It was never really our choice to begin with, we sorta had no choice but to join up. Anyway, we decided a few orns ago to check out the civilian life. It was a friendly parting, and Blaster's still our buddy, but it was time we moved on. So no big scandal, nothing traumatic, it's all good. We're free mechs now, though ..." here, they shot Anodyne a quick look, "... and we're _courting _a certain brilliant medic-to-be."

Anodyne added, "Slamdance is spark-split twins with a gestalt mode, and they prefer that you refer to them as plural. They're unusually well suited for a gestalt and they prefer to be together. Raindance and Grand Slam are their individual names."

"But if you just call us Slamdance and treat the two of us like one mech, we're cool with that, too." Slamdance shrugged easily.

Resonance nodded slowly. "You knew my guardian, Wheeljack, I believe. He told me about you."

"Wheeljack!" They said, optics lighting up. "Yes, yes, we know him. We worked with him, fought with him, he designed our gestalt mode! He's your carrier? That's _so _awesome. Is he on Cybertron? We'd like to see him, he's a friend, you're _so _lucky ..."

Dryly, Anodyne said, "Slamdance is the master of run-on sentences. He's worse than Bluestreak."

"We are _not_. It's just a side effect of two minds channeling through one vocalizer. We can talk separately, but then we just talk over each other and it's really confusing for everyone, and ..."

"I understand." Resonance said, with a smile. "Will I be sharing this room with all of you?"

"Nah, Slamdance has an apartment of their own." Scout spoke for the first time. "You're just stuck with me'n Agility and the boss. Slamdance just hangs with us when we've got the time."

The cybercat jumped up on Resonance's berth, which put her head even with Resonance's hip. Anodyne watched closely, wondering how Resonance would react. There were two typical responses mecha had to Scout: Either they were afraid of her, or they tried to pet her and treat her like a mechanimal.

Resonance stood very still as Scout studied him. Her nasal passages were flared, and somewhere deep in her chest, a fan whirred as it pulled air over truly powerful and elaborate chemoreceptive arrays. She finally said, "You have no fear."

"Should I?" Resonance asked, sounding genuinely curious. He leaned back against the window sill, unbothered by her scrutiny.

"Yes."

Resonance chuckled at that, much to Anodyne's relief and amusement. Scout, for her part, was mildly irritated at his gentle amusement, but Anodyne thought that Resonance's reaction was perfect. Scout liked to think she was tough, but she was young and inexperienced. Resonance said, "Thank you for the warning, m'lady."

Scout grinned at him, baring a formidable array of very sharp teeth. It wasn't entirely a nice expression, but at least she wasn't being overtly hostile.

Agility tugged at Anodyne's wrist, and Anodyne reflexively picked up the tiny mechling. Though fully adult, Agility often seemed far younger than his years. Anodyne balanced the mechling on his hip like one would a sparkling, and Agility snuggled silently into his chassis. "Agility doesn't talk much," Anodyne explained. "He's not a minor, and he's fully sentient and competent, but he doesn't like to speak aloud."

Resonance nodded. "I understand."

_~Tell him about me~ _Agility said, _~he's got a nice spark.~_

_~Love, I don't think that's an appropriate thing to say to another mech.~ _Agility just didn't _get_ innuendo. Anodyne barely managed to keep his embarrassment from flooding the bond he shared with Agility and Scout. Telling another mech he had a nice spark was tantamount to propositioning him, and that was certainly not what Agility meant.

_~But it is nice. It's so old and warm and stuff. He's so calm and quiet, and he's just curious about us, he doesn't think bad thoughts or anything.~_

_~Ah. Can I tell him a bit about you?~_

_~Yeah, I like his spark.~_

"Agility is a reformat," Anodyne explained, stroking Agility's back as he talked. "We don't know a lot about his history before the reformat, but afterwards was pretty ugly. Shockwave was experimenting on him. The trauma left a mark on his spark. We're pretty sure he wasn't originally a symbiont - he's got a mechling frametype, but his CNA doesn't match his frame. He and I have been together a few vorns though, and we're a good team. Anyway, he wants you to know all that, so you know _why _he's different."

"I see ..." Resonance seemed about to add something else, then fell silent.

"He's empathic to a very high degree due to the mods that Shockwave forced on him. He can't block it out, and it's borderline crippling to him sometimes. And by the way, he says you feel warm and he likes you, which is high praise from him."

The brightly colored flier grinned broadly, optics lighting up. "Thank you, Agility."

Resonance spoke directly to Agility, something most mecha didn't do. Agility reacted by silently burying his face in Anodyne's side.

Resonance's expression fell. He was clearly disappointed.

"He's shy." Anodyne stroked Agility's back. "Give him time."

"It's fine." Resonance sat down on his berth next to Scout. Anodyne tensed, waiting for Resonance to try to pat her, but simply reached back and pulled one of his storage crates forward. He opened it, produced a box of energon sweets, and - after selecting one for himself - offered the box to Scout. "Would you like one?"

Scout picked out a sweet, and Resonance then held the box out in Anodyne's direction. "And you?"

Anodyne was surprised when he bit into the sweet. It was _very _good, better than anything he'd found in Iacon. "These are excellent - here, Agility." He offered half a sweet to tiny Agility, who nibbled delicately on it while avoiding looking at anyone in the room. "Where did you get them?"

Resonance offered the box to Slamdance, who took two pieces.

The young flier explained, "I made them."

"You _made _them? I am impressed."

"Don't be. I learned to cook out of self defense." Resonance's expression was now wry, and a bit annoyed. "My guardian has a tendency to blow up the kitchen."

Anodyne had _no _idea why Slamdance suddenly bent over in a fit of giggles, but Resonance clearly found nothing abnormal about that extreme reaction. He simply flashed Slamdance a quick smile. The brief annoyance on his face vanished as quickly as it had appeared.

~_I like him,~ _Agility murmured.

So did Anodyne. He said tentatively, "So ... did you have any plans this afternoon? We could go out and get a drink or something."

"Sounds good to me." Resonance's smile was brilliant, baring his perfect white teeth.

* * *

Resonance sipped his drink and listened intently to the absolute novelty of live music. The band, as far as he could tell, was very good. The drink he'd ordered was a sweetened, chilled, fizzy form of mild high grade. It was something that Wheeljack would call a "frou-frou drink." Wheeljack liked his high grade neat and highly potent. Resonance, as a consequence, had avoided high grade entirely until Jazz, on a visit, had introduced him to more palatable types.

Anodyne was interesting, Resonance thought, and he hoped they would end up friends. The carrier was out on the dance floor at the moment, dancing with Slamdance. Slamdance was only waist high to the young carrier, but was more than energetic enough to make up for his lack of height.

Scout had vanished somewhere into the club's rafters as soon as they had arrived. Resonance had itched to stroke her sleek form, but the knowledge that she was sentient and would likely take his interest as either patronizing or, worse, sexual, had been enough to cause him to keep his hands to himself. She was beautiful, with sleek, glossy, finely polished black armor, and silver highlights, but he knew he could only admire that glorious frame from a distance unless invited to touch. And, he also knew, that invitation was very unlikely to be extended.

He'd met Steeljaw once, on Earth, when he was much younger. Steeljaw was an incredibly tactile mech, and he'd spent several glorious days wrestling and cuddling with the the symbiont. At the end of the visit, as he and Wheeljack were packing up to leave, Blaster had pulled him aside and made sure he understood that most cybercats would chew their own legs off before they allowed a sparkling to pick them up and carry them around. He had been very firmly warned to _never _touch a cybercat without the cybercat's express permission.

He'd tried to apologize to Steeljaw, who had laughed at him. Steeljaw, it seemed, _liked _being snuggled. Steeljaw, however, had reiterated Blaster's warning, and Eject, overhearing, had backed him up.

Agility was seated on crosslegged on the table beside him, attention focused on the music. The tiny mechling swayed in time with the beat, expression distant.

"Anything I can get you?" A server asked, padding up.

Resonance realized he'd nearly finished his high grade. He had a rather high tolerance, both because of his flightframe power plant and his size. "Another of the same."

"And you, sir?" The server asked Agility.

Agility hunched up and indicated a negative with a quick shake of his head.

Resonance frowned as the server walked away. Agility hadn't ordered anything, though Anodyne had gotten him a symbiont sized cube of high grade earlier. That drink was long gone. He suspected that Agility hadn't ordered anything this time because he was simply so painfully shy. When the server returned and left them a drink Resonance said casually, "I really like this drink. Have you ever had carbonated high grade?"

Agility looked up at him sharply, clear surprise on his face. Then he shook his head in a swift negative.

Resonance poured enough into Agility's empty cube to fill it. Agility gave him a long look, then picked up the cube and sipped it. His optics brightened and he flashed Resonance a quick smile.

He answered that smile with a grin of his own.

Agility looked away sharply. Then he craned his neck to look up at Resonance again and said softly, "Thank you, Resonance."

"You're welcome." Resonance said, keeping his tone casual, despite his pleasure at hearing Agility's voice. Making friends with Agility was a lot like befriending humans who were intimidated by his size, he thought. He just needed to put the mechling at ease, and make himself seem _normal_.

"Oooh, you're new," a rich, deep voice purred. Resonance jerked his head sideways and up in surprise. The speaker was another flier, a seeker, matte black with cobalt blue trim. "Haven't seen you around here before."

Agility made a _peep _of distress and disappeared off the table in a flash.

"They need to hire an exterminator. Too many scraplets in this place." The seeker, without invitation, pulled a chair out from the table and straddled it backwards.

"Who are you?" Resonance said, unable to keep his wings from lifting in an aggressive display of irritation. Agility was hiding under the table, pressed up against his legs. He'd have risen if he could have done it without potentially stepping on the symbiont.

"You _must _be the new student everyone's talking about." The seeker purred. "The one raised by a grounder?"

"By Wheeljack, yes." He summoned up a memory of one of the more formidable humans he'd known, a base commander, and said coldly, "Is there a point to insulting my friend and my guardian?"

"You have _no _idea who I am."

"I don't particularly care."

"I'm _Quasar_."

"Quasar." He searched his memory and came up blank. The seeker was likely as young as he looked. He wasn't someone that Wheeljack had ever told him about.

Under the table, Agility scrambled into Resonance's lap. He put a hand on the symbiont's back, and stroked soothingly. Across the room, out of his peripheral vision, he could see Anodyne approaching at a fast walk.

"Starscream's. Son." Quasar bit out.

"Ah. I'm afraid I grew up offworld. I'm only familiar with mecha who have done something important. Your name never came up in my lessons, through your sire - yes, of course I know of him." Resonance was being deliberately insulting, and he didn't care. Quasar rubbed him the wrong way.

"Quasar, stop harassing the newbie." Not Anodyne, but another mech came to his rescue. He looked up and smiled with relief at a slightly familiar face.

"Ratchet!" Resonance felt relief surge through his spark. Quasar was clearly hostile, but Ratchet, he knew from Wheeljack's stories, was _formidable_. He'd met the medic a few times when he was very young, as well, and had been duly impressed.

Ratchet grunted something that might have been a greeting, even as Anodyne arrived.

Anodyne's response was _far _less polite than Ratchet's casual request. "Quasar, get lost."

"Since when did you hang with flightframes? I thought your thing was sparklings." Quasar hissed at Anodyne, and pointed one finger at Slamdance.

Anodyne simply lifted one optic ridge. "Do we need to take this outside?"

Agility squeaked and disappeared back under the table. He departed Resonance's lap and fled for parts unknown.

"Quasar, leave. Now. And Slamdance is older than you are." Ratchet grabbed the seeker by the tip of one wing and pulled him to his feet. He ignored Quasar's hiss, and shoved the youngling hard in the direction of the door. Quasar started to turn, as if to fight, but then he reconsidered. Ratchet and Anodyne were both large mechs - Ratchet wasn't tall, but he was _powerful _\- and Resonance had risen, towering over both of them. Quasar looked up, _way _up, at Resonance for a long, long, moment.

"Who's your sire anyway, a dreadnought?" Quasar hissed at Resonance.

"His guardian is someone far scarier. Ask Starscream about Wheeljack." Ratchet said, with a smirk. "Who, by the way, is teaching the Cybernetic Engineering class you're enrolled in this semester."

Quasar flicked his wings up. "So? Resonance is in _my _progenitor's course."

Anodyne scoffed, "Starscream's going to be too busy watching his shiny aft to give him a hard time. You know what your sire likes."

Quasar's hiss was vile, and laced with subvocal insults.

"Forget Soundwave's brat. You want to try saying that to _me _outside?" Ratchet growled, armor fluffing up.

"You're not worth my time." Quasar flounced off, wings held at an artificially high angle.

Anodyne turned swiftly to face Ratchet. "Professor, _thank _you."

"I hate that kid." Ratchet snapped, candidly. "Useless waste of energon. - Resonance, are you okay?"

"I am fine. Ratchet, thank you for interceding. I was not sure how to handle him."

"Handle him? I'd suggest using very, very, long tongs. He probably bites." Ratchet folded his arms across his broad chest and vented a sigh. "I'm sorry. I am being unprofessional. That kid just gets my struts in a twist. If it were still the war, we'd have slagged him a long time ago - if his own side didn't frag him first."

Apparently realizing that he was winding himself up to another moment of unprofessional venting, Ratchet grunted, exhaled sharply through his fans, and fluffed and relaxed his armor.

Resonance, amused, decided in that moment that he liked the cranky old doctor and wanted to get to know him better. He said, "Would you like to join us for a drink, Ratchet?"

Anodyne gave him a somewhat alarmed look. However, Agility popped up from under the table, and Slamdance said, "Yeah, Ratch. Have a drink, on me. We think we owe you one anyway."

"Owe me ...?"

"Yeah, for that time you covered for me while I decorated Prowl's office for Christmas."

"Oh, that." Ratchet laughed, expression brightening. "That was a truly worthy prank. - Sure, I'll have a Praxian high grade."

* * *

Ratchet knew he shouldn't be sitting at a table with two students. Aside from the fact they were students, one of them was Soundwave's youngling and the other the reincarnation of everloving Optimus Prime. This was just so many kinds of wrong.

Ratchet gave himself a strictly mental shake. It wasn't fair to Resonance to compare him to the late Prime. Or to hold Anodyne responsible for his sire's actions during the war. Anodyne, as far as he could tell, was a good kid. He was studious and responsible, and would likely be a nice friend for Resonance. Soundwave, to no one's surprise, had settled down into a quietly domestic life after the war, had found a demure little femme for a partner, and they had raised good kids. Anodyne was the eldest, but the whole family of six younglings was turning out well.

Anodyne, much to Ratchet's secret amusement, was also terrified of him. Most of the students were. Ratchet liked it that way. He'd had Anodyne in Cybernetic Biochemistry last semester and he'd done nothing to dissuade what he considered healthy respect.

Resonance was not - yet - fearful of him, however. Resonance was relaxed in his presence, optics alert and wings held at an angle that was calm and interested. Ratchet sourly thought _that _would change as soon as the kid got to know him, and heard a few of the stories from the other students.

"... Ratchet? Are you okay?"

He realized, belatedly, that Resonance had asked him a question. He'd been lost in thought and had completely missed it. "Sorry. Come again?"

"Getting senile, old mech?" Slamdance demanded.

Slamdance was another mech who wasn't afraid of him. Slamdance was unique, to say the least, and they had survived a pretty hellacious life. Ratchet suspected that given some of Slamdance's past history, Ratchet's temper and reputation barely registered.

"No. But I think you're getting crazier every time I meet you."

Slamdance grinned.

Resonance, meanwhile, was just sitting in silence, wings drooping.

"He asked if you wanted to dance," Slamdance stage-whispered. "You were staring at him. I think you hurt his feelings."

"No, I don't want to dance!" Ratchet snapped, short and sharp, alarm thrilling through his circuits. He _couldn't_. It would be so many kinds of wrong that he couldn't count them all. Sitting with Resonance, having _anything _to do with Resonance, had been a bad idea from the beginning. Pit. He should have just let Anodyne deal with Quasar. Why had he even gotten involved at all?

Resonance's wings pinned flat to his back in response to Ratchet's tone. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to offend you. I ... well, Wheeljack said you can dance, and all the dancing I've done has been with Jackie and a few visitors - Jazz, Blaster - and lots of drones. And I like dancing and dancing with you sounded fun."

Anodyne was glaring at him. So were both smaller symbionts and Slamdance. Resonance just looked like somebody had kicked his turbopuppy. The young flier had also done a remarkable impression of Bluestreak, something that shattered the almost-like-Optimus image with complete and total finality.

"No." Ratchet said, rising from the table. "Primus. Good _night_."

Behind him, as he stalked off, he heard Anodyne swear softly, and then say sharply and louder, "C'mon, Res. He's _always _an aft. I'll dance with you."

It was, Ratchet thought, the best way to handle matters. Resonance was not Optimus, and he had no desire to be the young mech's friend.

* * *

Resonance lay curled up on his berth, motionless, back to the room, trying hard to recharge and failing miserably. He'd faked a good mood for the rest of the evening, but now that he was back in his room and it was time to power down, his mind was spinning and his spark was in a knot.

What had he _said_? Quasar's hostility had been understandable, if upsetting. Ratchet, however, was a close friend of his guardian and was, while legendarily cranky, not _mean_. At least, not according to Wheeljack, who had often spoken fondly about the former Autobot CMO.

Had he done something wrong? Had he missed a social cue? Was it something _about _him? First Ratchet had come to his rescue, then just as swiftly had brushed him off. That dismissal had hurt. Never in his life had anyone treated Resonance so rudely. He just could not figure out why.

A small hand touched his shoulder. He startled, a little, then recognized the faint brush of Agility's EM field, which was whisper quiet and nearly impossible to read.

Across the room, Anodyne was probably asleep. Using a very low power tight band comm channel, he asked Agility, _:Are you okay?:_

_:You're hurting.: _Agility walked around Resonance's head and sat down against his chest. The little symbiont's frame was warm and light.

_:I'm okay.:_

_:You're not. And Ratchet is worse.:_

_:What do you mean?:_

A small hand patted his shoulder. _:Every time he looks at you, Ratchet hurts. He grieves. It makes him angry and disappointed and bitter. It wasn't anything you did, Resonance. Ratchet's spark is hurt and he lashes out because of it.:_

_:Why?:_

_:I don't know. I'm an empath, not a telepath.: _Agility tucked his knees to his chest. _:You're not a primally born mech, are you?:_

_:What? How did you know?:_

Agility shrugged, his shoulders brushing against Resonance's back. _:You''re a reformat. Like me.:_

_:... I'm vat born, but not a reformat. But you can't tell _anyone_. They'd never let me into the university if they knew.:_

_:I won't tell anyone.: _Agility sighed. _:But you're not vat born. You've got an old spark. _Really _old. You didn't know?:_

_:Uh - no, I'm just vat born. Wheeljack found me in a vat. I'm sure he would have checked my spark age and told me if I was a reformat.:_

_:Huh.: _Agility twisted around to face him. The blue glow from Resonance's optics softly lit the little symbiont's delicate features. _:Okay. Perhaps I was wrong. Don't worry, though, I won't tell anyone.:_

_:Thanks.: _Resonance said, wrily.

Behind him, across the room, there was a whisper of sound. Then, another. Rhythmic rocking, creaking, clicking, quiet clanks, soft murmurs. Resonance started to roll over, and Agility stopped him with a hand on his arm. _:Give them some privacy, okay?:_

_:... what?:_

_:Slamdance and Anodyne.:_

_:... What?: _And then he realized what was going on behind him, on Anodyne's berth. Furious embarrassment flooded his spark.

_:They thought you were in recharge.: _Agility seemed amused. _:Mind if Scout and I recharge with you tonight?:_

_:Uh ...:_

_:Just_ _recharge, pretty boy.: _Scout jumped up on the berth and promptly curled up against the small of his back. _:You'll learn to ignore them. We do.:_

_:Uh ... I thought they were, uh, courting.:_

_:Maybe. Maybe they'll end up lovers. Maybe carrier and symbiont. Maybe both.:_

_:How does that even work?:_

_:Well, tab A inserts into slot B.: _Scout said, dryly. _:Very carefully, given the size difference.:_

_:I know _that _much!: _He really, really, wished he was not having this conversation. He shut his optics off, because the light from somebody _else's _optics was creating rhythmically moving shadows on the wall. Pure mortification flooded his system. If the berth could have folded around him and swallowed him whole, he would have been thrilled.

_:Virgin, huh?: _Scout's voice was deeply, truly, amused.

_:That is _none _of your business!: _He was tempted to shove her off onto the floor, except that if he moved then Anodyne and Slamdance might realize he was awake. Somehow, if they _knew _he was watching - or, err, curling up in the dark with his optics shuttered and determinedly _not _watching - it would would be even more embarrassing.

_:Let him be, Scout.: _Agility's voice was surprisingly assertive. _:Quit teasing him. He's not exactly had any opportunity to break his seals, y'know? Given his history and all.:_

_:Since when do you talk to strangers?: _Scout demanded.

_:I like him.: _Scout shrugged, arms brushing against Resonance's chest. _:And Resonance, just ignore them. Welcome to university life.:_

On the other side of the room, Anodyne grunted very softly. Slamdance cried out, equally softly. It sounded as if Slamdance was in pain, but then Resonance heard the urgently whispered words, "Pit, do that again!" from the twinned symbionts.

Resonance wanted nothing more than to drop dead. He wasn't sure he could _ever _look either of them in the eyes again without dying of a terminal case of mortification.

Welcome to university life indeed.

Agility snickered.


	3. Chapter 3

Reconstruction

* * *

Chapter 3

* * *

Resonance woke to the sound of giggling. He lifted his head up to find that Slamdance was tickling Agility mercilessly.

"M-morning, Res." Agility said, after wriggling free of Slamdance's grasp.

"Sorry, Res, about last night." Slamdance added. "We thought you were in recharge."

"Uh ... about that. Don't you have an apartment of your own?" Somehow, he managed not to die on the spot of mortal embarrassment.

Slamdance shrugged. "Anodyne doesn't fit in our berth."

"Uh ... yeah." He scrubbed at his face. "Look, just ... let me know or something, before you get intimate. I'll go for a walk."

"You're cool with us, right?" Slamdance asked. "We mean, some mecha have issues with symbionts and carriers to start with, but what we're doing - it's _totally _consensual. Pit, we started it. Anodyne's got some _moves, _and he's an adult and we're an adult. And ... slag, you're not an adult yet, legally, are you?"

"Not for a few more orns." Now simply amused, he sat up. Slamdance's look of dawning horror very nearly made him snicker. "You realize you are responsible for scarring me for life."

Slamdance sighed, and scratched their head, then said, "I'll buy a bigger berth for our apartment."

"_Thank _you," Resonance said, with real feeling. "Where's Anodyne?"

"Wash rack, with Scout." Slamdance reached under Anodyne's berth and retrieved a pulse rifle, which he subspaced with the practiced ease of a soldier. "Look, we'll see you later, kid. No more funny business. Promise."

"I appreciate the courtesy."

After Slamdance had left, Agility started snickering. "They're more embarrassed than _you _were."

Resonance thought about that for a minute, then said, "Good. Serves them right. - I'm going down to the dining hall to fuel. Do you want to come with me?"

"Sure." Agility held his arms up, and it took Resonance a moment to realize that the symbiont wanted to be picked up. Obligingly, and with the same care he'd give a similar-sized human, he gently lifted Agility up to his shoulder.

"Thanks. I hate walking in the halls. People don't watch where they're going." Agility found a comfortable perch. "And sometimes they try to pick me up when I _don't _want it, or they mistake me for a sparkling."

"Got it. My shoulder's yours any time you want a ride." Resonance stepped through doorway - he was tall enough that he had to duck just a little to avoid cracking Agility's head on the lintel - and then he headed down the hallway. Tomorrow was the first day of class, and most of the students had already arrived. The hall was busy, and he moved with caution, well aware of both his tiny passenger and his own great height and the wide span of his wings.

Many of the university students were minibots and small flightframes. The war had favored the survival of the quick, small, and alert. The children of those survivors were now reaching adulthood, but Resonance towered over all of them.

They looked at him suspiciously, too, at least until a cheerful voice shouted, "Res!"

He turned, and grinned, as Jazz trotted down the hall towards him. The little minibot held up a hand for a high five, which Resonance returned.

"Settling in?" Jazz asked, then after a pointed glance at the rider on Resonance's shoulders, "And making friends, looks like?"

"This is Agility." The symbiont had gone still and quiet, and was clinging tightly to Resonance's shoulder pauldron. "Agility, this is Jazz, a friend of my guardian."

Agility said nothing, but his quiet field flared briefly in what might have been surprise.

"Ah know Agility, an' his boss. Anodyne's a good kid."

"Jazz, what are you doing here? - That came out rude. I am sorry. I am glad to see you, just surprised."

Jazz grinned. "No worries, m'mech. I'm just here to deal with a bit of student drama that escalated to the point of dents. Prowl needed to know if the enforcers should get involved."

"I see."

"Turns out it was a case of mutual stupidity. Love triangle that imploded. No enforcers needed. Prowl only gets involved when it's either a case of bullying, bigotry, or it is politically sensitive. Normal run-of-the-mill crime, the campus cops get the joy of dealin' with." Jazz shrugged expansively. "So ah'm free now. Want to get breakfast with me? Been vorns since ah had a chance t' talk t' ya."

"Uh - sure. Agility, you want to come?" Agility was clinging to his shoulder like a space barnacle, field drawn in so tight that Resonance couldn't sense it even though they were physically touching. Resonance added, "Jazz is a friend, I promise. I've known him since I was a tiny sparkling. He visited us a couple times a vorn when I was growing up."

Agility was silent for a long, long, moment. Then he commed Resonance, _:I'll go find Anodyne.:_

Before Resonance could say anything, Agility had nimbly scrambled down Resonance's back, using his flight kibble for handholds. The symbiont darted off, running headlong down the hall.

Jazz sighed, watching him go. "How'd you make friends with him? Agility's had a heckuva rough go of it. Ah thought Anodyne and Scout - and Soundwave - were the only people he trusted."

"I'm not sure. He says he likes the feel of my spark."

Jazz, somewhat to Resonance's surprise (and relief), did not make an innuendo out of that. He just _hmmed _thoughtfully, then said, "Walk with me, will ya?"

The former Autobot TIC didn't say anything more until they were outside and away from other students. Then, voice soft, he said, "Yah doin' okay, kid? Ah heard about what happened with Ratchet."

"From who?"

"Ah've got my sources." Jazz said, easily.

"Agility says that Ratchet's lashing out because he hurts. I don't understand what that has to do with me."

"Ratchet's got issues, sure 'nuff. But ya didn't answer my question. How are _you _doing?"

"I'll survive. Thank you for asking. Should I just avoid him?"

Jazz scratched one sensory horn. "Not sure, honestly. Play it by ear, as the humans would say."

"I will do that." Resonance agreed.

"Ratch' is a good mech, Res. Just give him time. He doesn't make friends easy, but Pit, if you can win Agility's trust in a day, mebbe you got a chance with the good doc, too. Primus knows he needs friends."

* * *

"Honestly," Ratchet groused, after three hours in surgery spent patching up _stupid _students, "those three should just form a triad."

First Aid snorted behind his mask. Swoop giggled.

"What?" Ratchet stalked down the hall, with the two younger physicians following him. "Not being funny. Just being honest."

First Aid said, thoughtfully, "I'll drop Rung a note. Maybe he can talk to them about it. It _would _solve a lot of drama."

"And I won't be pulling dents out in the early-ack-AM hours." Ratchet grimaced. "Below my slagging pay grade."

"Aw, you love it." First Aid teased.

"Inflicting pain. He does it well." Swoop put his two cents in. "Loves every minute."

"Shut up, both of you. Scram. Don't you have classes to teach?"

First Aid grinned, and ducked out of range of Ratchet's cranky swipe at his helm. Swoop dodged a kick at his aft with a startled, "Awk!" and a flare of his wings. And then both younger doctors hurried out of his range of his legendary temper. It was unwise to tease Ratchet past a certain point.

Ratchet watched them go. He had papers to grade, and quarterly assessments of his subordinates to write. With the thought of paperwork in his mind, he huffed a sigh and trudged down the hall towards his office.

A lanky red, white, and blue seeker was leaning against the wall beside his office door. Ratchet's mood, already sour, turned positively putrid. "What do you want?"

Starscream straightened up, and flashed Ratchet a bright grin that bared many sharp teeth. "I hear you disciplined my brat last night."

Ratchet palmed open the door and left it open. Starscream followed him in. Ratchet slapped the door shut only after the seeker was inside. "Quasar had it coming."

"I don't doubt it." Starscream flicked his wings dismissively. "Just trying to figure out what happened."

"He was trying to bully a new student, and was also picking on Anodyne's symbiont."

Starscream hissed in aggravation and dismay. "I've _told _him to leave Anodyne alone. Anodyne could rip his wings off if he chose."

"Yes, and not many would stand in his way. - Besides which, Agility can take care of himself. Something Quasar hasn't figured out yet."

Starscream snorted. "Something you know about the runt that I don't?"

Ratchet sprawled into his desk chair. "He's one of Shockwave's creations. Don't underestimate him. He's never been defanged. We never saw a need. If he puts the whammy on Quasar, Quasar has it coming."

"I'll have a word with the brat. Again. Primus. I was _never _that stupid, nor was Skywarp!" Starscream ran a hand over his face. "What about the new student? Wheeljack's latest kid."

"Res?" Ratchet considered his words carefully. "I would suggest treating Resonance with respect. He is young, but he is neither naive nor lacking in intelligence. He may have had little contact with our kind, but he has lived among humans for tens of their generations."

"Humans." Starscream made the word sound like it contained, as humans would say, only four letters. "We'll see."

Ratchet smirked at the former Decepticon air commander. "You haven't _met _him yet, have you?"

"Only heard gossip."

"He's Skyfire's height, he's bright sparkly red, and his admission scores were better than _yours_, my fine flighted friend."

"You're saying he's my type," Starscream said, sourly. If the strength of Starscream's glare had been converted to thermal energy, it could have melted duryllium.

"And I'll have your spike for a paperweight if you make a move on him, Screamer." Ratchet's was unmoved by Starscream's irritation, and he couldn't help but feel protective about Resonance. He didn't want to actually _see _Resonance more than he had to, but he'd pull out all the stops to protect him. "He's _never _been around other Cybertronians before, except for Jackie and the occasional Autobot visitor surveying the energon plants on Titan. Maybe a mech here and there on Earth. Think he met Blaster and company once. But my point is - he's a _kid_ and he's a lot more innocent than his age would imply. Keep your claws to yourself, or I'll remove them right along with that famous spike of yours."

"Bold words."

"Not a threat. A promise." Ratchet said, firmly.

Starscream's annoyance was replaced with frank curiosity. "What is he to you?"

"Wheeljack's kid. And Wheeljack is my best friend."

Starscream rubbed his forehead with two long, clawed, fingers. "Whatever. See you later, Ratchet. Thanks for the head's up on my bratling."

* * *

Starscream had known Ratchet a very long time. They had been acquainted well before the war, had been mortal enemies for most of it, and had ended up with a cautious and grudgingly respectful relationship afterwards. Sometimes, they were _almost _friends, inasmuch as Starscream had any friends. Therefore, Starscream took Ratchet's blunt warning seriously.

The first time he saw Resonance, he knew why Ratchet had warned him off.

_Slag _the medic. Ratchet knew him far too well.

Resonance stood on the roof of the observatory, Iacon University's tallest building. There were a dozen other fliers with him - all of this year's flightframed students. Resonance was tallest of them, and the only one with a space-capable alt. The others were all light fliers, with frames meant only for atmospheric travel. No seekers among them this semester, though there were two small jets that might have had seeker CNA in their ancestry.

Resonance was head and shoulders taller than anyone around him, and a discrete scan as Starscream landed showed he was subspacing a good seventy percent of his mass. Transformed, he'd be shuttle class - _small _shuttle class, but shuttle class nonetheless.

Everything about him spoke of quality construction, from the bright gleam of his paint to the smooth, agile way he turned at Starscream's arrival. His root mode was well balanced, with slim hips, elegant wings, long legs and arms, and nimble hands. His thrusters were in his feet, and it was clear he could fly without transforming - his wings were certainly aerodynamic enough even in root mode.

He held himself with pride and dignity, and a deep, quiet calm. Chatter and excitement ran through the rest of the fliers as Starscream landed, but Resonance simply regarded him with honest interest.

_Skyfire_, Starscream thought. Resonance reminded him a great deal of a young Skyfire. Oh, Primus. Ratchet knew him far, far, too well.

He was doomed. Death by Hatchet. It was inevitable.

* * *

An hour later, Starscream was a lot less impressed. Incompetence at flying was a huge turnoff for the seeker.

"No, no, _no_!" He screeched, although Res couldn't hear him at this distance. The big shuttle went into a flat spin for the third time. Resonance was _supposed _to be demonstrating his acrobatic skills, but it seemed he had none. Starscream watched in vague horror as Resonance struggled to recover, flipped upside down in the process, and proceeded to tumble nose over tail and wing over wing in an uncontrolled fall.

Starscream, hovering on his thrusters in the sky above all thirteen students, slapped his palm to his face.

Resonance finally gave up on proper flight, transformed, thrashed a bit in Cybertron's thin air, and then found his balance on his thrusters and successfully stopped his fall before he smacked into the ground. Sheepishly, he waved at Starscream, and then accelerated with a blast of his thrusters before transforming back into root mode.

It wasn't a very good transformation, at least not by the former air commander's standards. Resonance wobbled, wings dipping, and then he overcompensated with a blast of his giant engines that looked panicky, not like it was an attempt to show off.

Alrighty then. He'd seen enough.

_:You. Idiot in red.: _Starscream barked at the shuttle. _:Land. Now.: _

_:May I try the maneuver one more time?: _Resonance asked, polite and determined. _:I learned to fly on Titan. The atmosphere is far thicker and the gravity less. I am recalibrating my reflexes ...:_

_:Recalibrating my aft ... you're _how _old?: _He demanded, scandalized. And horrified. At Resonance's age of twenty vorns, he should have had basic flight maneuvers mastered ... oh, about twenty vorns ago. _:Nevermind. _Land_.:_

He ordered the other students to practice canyon runs through the vast network of deep chasms, tunnels, and caves east of Iacon, and then he followed Resonance down to the ground. Resonance transformed, clearly meaning to land on his feet. _:Land on the runway at the shuttle port.:_

He expected argument when he touched lightly down next to the big hulking dolt, but Resonance simply said, "I know I have a lot to learn, Air Commander. I am ... honored ... to learn from you."

The kid's field was endearingly earnest. Bright blue optics, a bit embarrassed but not the least bit defiant, met Starscream's.

Starscream facepalmed again. "Transform, lackwatt."

"Are you going to fly me through the maneuvers?"

_Now _he expected argument. That was a tactic generally used only for very, very, young sparklings. Unfortunately, Resonance not only flew like a sparkling, he flew like one with poor natural instincts and some bad habits. Resonance needed a hand on his controls not only for his own good, but for the safety of everyone around him.

"Let me guess - that idiot Wheeljack taught you to fly?"

"And humans." Resonance had the good grace to look sheepish, at least.

"_Primus. _How could humans teach you to fly - they'd go _splat _if you pulled too many gees! Transform, glitchwit."

Without further arguing, and with a calm and accepting field despite Starscream's insults, Resonance did so. As Starscream had earlier suspected, his alt mode was large enough to carry several full-size mecha. He had a flight cabin with seats large enough to accommodate Starscream, which made sense for shuttle that had interstellar capability. Shuttles had to recharge and defrag sometime, and it was best if he had a pilot when they did.

"Did you travel all the way from Titan to Cybertron yourself?" Starscream settled into the seat, and magnetized himself to it.

"With Wheeljack's guidance, and as far as one of Cybertron's moons, yes. They wouldn't let me land at the shuttle port here in Iacon without immigration papers and a flight license. Wheeljack was annoyed that we had to take a shuttle when I _am _a shuttle."

"And there are _very, very, _good reasons for that." Starscream sighed. He reached out and rested his hands on the controls. "Rules, kid. Rule number one, I'm flying - you're just observing unless I say otherwise. Rule number two, shut up. Rule number three, trust me."

"Understood." The young shuttle said, his field still and calm and completely unruffled.

Starscream found both his voice and his demeanor eerily familiar, though he couldn't place them. Resonance felt _older _than his vorns, as well; Starscream was more than a little curious about what his CNA would show. Telomeres didn't lie, even if records did, and he wondered if he could get a tiny sample of Resonance's protoform for testing ...

Starscream, as well as being the most skilled flier on Cybertron, was proud of his skills as a pilot. He could fly _anything_, be it his own frame, a dreadnought the size of a city, a remote control drone, or another mech. He sent Resonance hurtling down the runway at maximum thrust, which, he suspected, was _not _how Resonance normally launched. The kid struck him as a sedate, relaxed, and easy-going mech in all areas, and that would translate into his normal flying style. Resonance had never pushed his limits, likely because he didn't see the need.

Resonance reacted with a sharp spike in his field, but no verbal protest. Starscream sent him shooting into the sky at a forty-five degree angle, then pulled his nose up even further, until he was rocketing towards Cybertron's stratosphere with his tail pointed directly at the ground below.

Still no comment. No protest. Resonance's field had smoothed out a bit, though it was still tense.

Huh.

Starscream, with an evil smirk that he was certain Resonance would pick up on his internal sensors, ripped the controls to the right. Resonance went into a tumbling, flipping, uncontrolled stall.

Cybertron's air commander took his hands off the controls. "Now save yourself. _Without _transforming."

He could feel Resonance's frame shuddering around him. Starscream would _not _have tried this maneuver with most flight frames, but he had a solid knowledge of engineering and he'd checked Resonance's designs and stats before he'd ever set eyes on the kid. Resonance could handle the strain on his frame, easily.

Unsurprisingly, the ground grew closer and closer. Resonance had backed off on his thrust, and was trying to gain control by manipulating his ailerons and tail fin. He was only making the tumbling worse. Starscream sat, magnetized to his seat, arms folded across his chest, and ignored the crazy g-forces as best he could. The sky and the ground spun and tumbled across Resonance's windshield, often at odds with what inertia insisted was "up."

When they were within a few thousand feet of the ground, Starscream reached out and calmly said, "My turn, kid."

"You'd better bail. I can't transform with you in me." Resonance's field had real alarm in it now.

"Remind me to teach you to subspace your passengers," Starscream said, absently, as he applied some thrust, pointed Resonance's nose down, and accelerated out of the spinning stall. They screamed across the city with enough speed to rattle windows.

"How did you _do _that?" Resonance said, awe in his voice. Then, "Can you show me that again?"

"_You _are going to do that over and over again, until I'm sure you've got it mastered. Starting with tomorrow's lesson."

Sheepishly, Resonance said, "I'm afraid I'm not really built for acrobatics. I didn't think I could get out of that stall without transforming."

"Obviously, you can." Starscream growled. "And you can handle fancy flying just fine."

"Not really." Resonance sighed. "I'm not designed for it. I've tried to learn, but I'm not just nimble enough. I will learn everything I can from you, of course!"

"Pit." Starscream extended a sensor sweep in the direction of the deep canyons east of the city, where the other students were practicing canyon runs. Resonance was several times their size, but his frame had the strength and stability and his engines the power to fly circles around them. Starscream had analyzed the kid's _real _potential from his schematics and the short period he'd handled his controls.

They were cruising a mile high. Starscream casually steered Resonance towards the canyons and said, in a more civil tone of voice, "Why would you think that?"

"I've crashed. Several times."

"Ah. I've crashed more times than I can count. Including _recently_. It happens. Ratchet puts me back together. Unless you drill nose first into the ground at mach umpty-thousand, crashing is going to hurt, but the damage will be repairable."

"I really prefer not crashing."

"Thinh is, kid, we may _need _you." Starscream leaned casually back in the seat. "You're big, and believe it or not, you've got a lot of potential for combat despite your size. If the Quints attack - and we're very worried they might - I'm going to need every mech with wings, and I'm going to need them flying well. That means _you _need to learn to fly to your limits, not just lazily loaf around in the skies when it suits you."

Silence, from the shuttle.

Starscream ran a hand over his face. "You don't have much sky hunger, do you?"

"I like flying."

"But if you can't?"

"It ... doesn't bother me. Not like it's supposed to."

"Hnnh. Doesn't mean there's anything wrong with you, just means you're not a seeker. But ..." Starscream reached back out for the controls. "... it would be interesting to see what your CNA shows. I suspect you've got plenty of heavy ground transport in your CNA, with just enough flight genetics to give you wings."

"I don't know anything about my creators. They are most likely dead."

"Yeah, I know, I got your file from Skyfire." Starscream held the yoke lightly, eyeing the ground below. There was a suitably sized canyon coming into view. "That doesn't mean you can't be skilled flier. It does mean you need to work twice as hard as a mech with pure flight frame genetics."

Once upon a time, Starscream would have snobbishly insisted that no flier other than a seeker could truly fly _well_. He would have dismissed out of hand the idea of a mongrel like Resonance being a _good _flier. That had been before the war, and before Starscream had, out of necessity, trained many mecha just like Resonance. He'd learned a lot. And in peacetime, with time to think and process for several vorns, he'd learned even more.

Resonance didn't say anything for a long moment. Then he said, "I'm willing to put in the work, but it's never helped in the past."

"Ah, but you've never had _me _as a teacher." Starscream grinned.

He truly wanted to teach this mech, Starscream found. He had many complex reasons, but most of them were, actually, benign. Resonance was handsome, but he was far too young and innocent to truly interest the air commander. He was eye candy, yes, but nothing more than that.

"I mean no offense, Air Commander, but you have never been noted for your ... altruism." As if reading his mind, Resonance spoke calmly, but bluntly. "I would like to know your motives."

"Quite honestly? I actually _like _younglings, believe it or not." That was true. "I spent most of my life figuring out ways to teach fliers to kill other mecha. Odds are, I'll have to go back to it someday. But in the meantime ... I get a chance to teach kids to live up to their potential, and I _like _it."

At that, he pushed the yoke far forward. Resonance's field flared with alarm as Starscream sent him into a sharp dive.

"Trust me." Starscream said, a feral grin splitting his face. "I'm going to show you what your pretty wings can _really _do."

Resonance didn't scream, but his field flared with real alarm. Starscream had an iron grip on the controls, however, and he sent the shuttle diving down below the canyon rim. Resonance, proving he had a cool head to go with his calm demeanor, didn't fight Starscream's piloting. He also didn't feel frozen with terror, which impressed Starscream. He was simply letting Starscream pilot him, in deference to Starscream's vastly greater skills.

Starscream rolled him sideways, accelerated hard, and zipped between two narrow canyon walls. He then rocketed straight up, did a barrel roll through the air above the canyon, looped back, and dove through the _same _choke point. Past that narrow slot in the canyon there was a 180 degree u-turn, then a brief wide spot. Resonance shot through the narrow space so fast that he left a sonic boom in his wake, and his frame groaned as Starscream whipped him around the corner. The gees he pulled on that turn would have killed any organic on board. He was large enough that his left wingtip nearly brushed the canyon floor, and his right was above the rim.

They reached the short wide spot. Starscream rolled Resonance over so his right wing was skimming above the ground. Then the canyon plunged deeper, and they shot down, down, into the dark depths. Resonance's lights were the only illumination by the time they reached the bottom of the canyon, and he was still rolled on his side, one wing mere feet above the ground..

A natural bridge appeared, blocking their path. Starscream, who had been expecting it, flipped Resonance completely upside down and skimmed between it and the ground. There were only a few scant feet between the canyon walls and Resonance's wingtips.

Resonance's field was now thick with terror, but he still wasn't fighting.

The air commander finally took mercy on the kid, navigated one last narrow bit of slot canyon, and then shot skyward, spinning Resonance in a showy spiral as he did.

"See?" Starscream said, unable to keep a bit of gloating out of his voice. "I know flight frames. You, my fine young friend, have potential. You just need to learn to use it."

"I ... can see that." Resonance sounded shaken. "I'll do my best to learn."

"Mmmhmm." Starscream leaned back in the seat. "Tomorrow, we'll work on your stall recovery until you've got it down. And then you'll learn the fancy stuff."

"Thank you."

"Don't _thank _me." He couldn't quite keep the screech out of his voice. "Just _do _it. I ... nearly lost a friend once ... because he couldn't pull out of a stall in time. We have too few really talented younglings as it is. I'm not losing a kid because his _idiot grounder guardian _never taught him _basic _flight maneuvers."

"Wheeljack's not an idiot and he's a good pilot. I just have limitations ..."

"Pit. I just proved those limits are glitches in your processor, not real. Wheeljack couldn't fly his way out of a water-vapor cloud without getting lost and upside down!" Starscream exvented. "Land. I trust you can do that without smearing us across the runway. Tomorrow, I'm going to start working your pretty little aft harder than you've ever worked before."

"Yes sir," Resonance said, "I'll be ready."

The kid, Starscream thought, was _altogether _too agreeable.

He was completely unsurprised to find that both Ratchet and Wheeljack were waiting for him at the end of the skyport runway. Resonance's flight would not have gone unnoticed, since Resonance was the only shuttle in the city aside from Skyfire, and Skyfire generally didn't go for acrobatics. (Though he _could_, and quite well, if pushed to it. Starscream might have mixed feelings about his former lover turned Autobot, but he had, at least, drilled stall recovery into Skyfire's circuits as soon as they'd become friends again. He wasn't losing him _again _to aerial incompetence.)

Resonance pulled to a halt, field still a bit agitated, and quickly popped his exit hatch. Starscream hid his own trepidation as best he could (Wheeljack was scary, Ratchet evil) and trotted down the stairs. Behind him, Resonance transformed, subspacing much of his mass as he did so that he was only head and shoulders taller than the rest of them.

Ratchet glared at Starscream.

Wheeljack grinned at Starscream.

"What was _that_?" Ratchet demanded.

Wheeljack answered Ratchet's question before Starscream could. "Some damn fine flying. See, Res, I told you that you'd learn a lot from him."

"You ... you _approve_?" Ratchet sputtered.

"Sure." Wheeljack clapped Starscream on the shoulder. "Thanks for helping my kid, Screamer. I'm a pilot, sure, but I've got grounder instincts."

"He ... he ... he could _hurt _Resonance!"

"I would not!" Starscream protested.

Ratchet spluttered.

Resonance said agreeably, "I am uninjured, Ratchet, and I learned a great deal. I will be going up with Starscream again tomorrow."

"See? Kid's fine." Wheeljack shrugged. "Res, you'd better hurry if you want to get to your next class."

"Oh. Yeah." Resonance seemed a bit surprised by the amount of time that had passed. "Thank you, Starscream. I look forward to tomorrow's lesson."

"See you, kid," Starscream answered Resonance's smile with a toothy grin of his own. "You'll be up to speed in no time."

After Resonance had trotted off in the direction of the campus, Ratchet rounded on Starscream with his plating fluffed and his optics blazing. "If you so much as cause _one scratch _on that youngling's plating, Screamer, I will take you _apart_."

"Oh, relax." Wheeljack cuffed Ratchet on the arm. "Res'll probably get dented up a few times. It's all part of learning to _really _fly. You know that. What kid doesn't crash regularly? Pit, _Screamy _crashes sometimes."

"I do not!" Starscream objected, on general principles.

"Res ... res is _different_!" Ratchet sputtered, at the same time.

"How so?" Starscream said, honing in on that statement with sharp curiosity. What was so different about the kid that Ratchet had his struts in a twist over him? 'Wheeljack's kid' was just not enough of an explanation. "It's not like you to worry about a few scratches on a youngling, _Doc_. Pit, you _give _as many dents as you fix."

Ratchet spluttered indignantly.

Wheeljack guffawed. "Starscream, haven't you figured it out? Pretty little Res is Ratchet's type too."

"He. Is. Not!" The medic's protest hit a pitch normally reserved for Starscream at his worst. He spun and tried to smack Wheeljack, but Jackie was already out of reach.

Starscream threw his head back and laughed. He could hear the truth in Ratchet's objection, and feel it in the angry flare of his field. Wheeljack snickered. "And the docbot protests too much."

"Not Res! He's just a kid!" Ratchet spluttered. Starscream, amused, realized he had something he could tease the old medic about for, oh, the next thousand vorns or so.

"Not so much of a kid anymore, Ratch. And Res can handle himself. He's _my _kid." Wheeljack seemed deeply, deeply, amused.

Starscream kept laughing, though now it was carefully feigned to sound authentic as he thought fast.

Resonance was _Wheeljack's _kid. Wheeljack was known for raising a plethora of orphans, strays, and vatlings. The inventor liked younglings, and it hadn't seemed strange for Wheeljack to show up with another one in tow.

... But Ratchet had said Resonance was _different_.

And Wheeljack was a very, very, talented bioengineer. Only the engineer's spark deep sense of ethics had kept him from being real competition for Shockwave. Ratchet might be able to fix anyone, but Wheeljack could _make _mechs from little more than a spark, spare parts, and random scraps and raw chemicals.

Hmmm.

It seemed he had some investigating to do.


	4. Chapter 4

Reconstruction

* * *

Chapter four

* * *

"I _am _getting flames," Resonance said. After his first week of university classes, he'd come "home" to Wheeljack's apartment for a meal and some much-desired time with his guardian. While he was making friends at school, he _missed _Wheeljack. He even missed the constant teasing that had been a part of his life with Wheeljack for as long as he could remember.

Resonance stretched his long legs out under Wheeljack's dining table, and fixed Wheeljack with a grin. "And they'll be blue if you don't knock it off."

"Knock what off?" Wheeljack said, innocently, as he stirred a pot of energon over a burner. "I haven't any idea what you're talking about. Starscream is a _fine _mech. You should be honored if you catch his interest."

"I'm getting flames _regardless _of what you think Starscream will think. Primus, Wheeljack, I don't care if he stares at my wings. He's not actually interested in me beyond the aesthetic appeal, and he's not the first or last mech who will stare at me. Which, I'd point out, is _your _fault. You designed my frame."

"And flames will make the staring worse."

"Two orns, Wheeljack. _Two orns. _And then you can't stop me!" Resonance said, then sat bolt upright. Alarm snapped through his field and he pinned his wings tight to his back as he warned, "Jackie, that energon's overheating!"

"What?" Wheeljack turned to peer into the pot, just in time for it to catch fire with an alarming explosive _bang_. The apartment's windows shook. Resonance was briefly deafened. Wheeljack stumbled backwards, soot stains all up his front and across his face, and damage clearly visible on the left side of his face. Resonance lunged forward, clapped the lid on the burning pot of inflammable fuel, and turned off the heat.

"How bad are you hurt?" Resonance said, with real concern. It wouldn't be the first nor the last time that Wheeljack had damaged himself in the kitchen.

"Think I slagged half my face. _Damnit_." Wheeljack's pain tolerance was far higher than Resonance; Resonance thought he would have said a few words stronger than 'damnit' to describe the injuries if they were his.

"Earfin, too." Resonance informed him, taking in Wheeljack's cracked optic lens and melted fin. The fin flickered faintly, spat static, and then went dark. Resonance sighed, well used to seeing his guardian with varying states of self-inflicted damage. "Sit down, I'll get the first aid kit and the spare parts."

The first time he'd replaced one of Wheeljack's optics, he'd had to stand on a table (while Jackie sat down on a chair) to reach it. Over the vorns he'd gotten quite good at minor-to-moderate repairs. He'd even rebuilt and replaced one of Wheeljack's legs once, though that injury hadn't been self-inflicted accident. Titan's winds were dangerously powerful, and a storm had blown a communications tower over on top of the engineer.

He wasn't certified as a medic, but he knew what he was doing. He'd had a good teacher in Wheeljack, and access to every instructional manual he desired. So, he was a bit surprised when Wheeljack waved him off, "Nah, we'll go bother Ratchet."

"I can handle this."

"Oh, sure you can." Wheeljack's grin was crooked, showing he had damaged the neural wiring on one side of his face. Also an easy fix. "But Ratchet's more fun."

"Wheeljack, your idea of 'fun' has always been questionable."

Wheeljack rose, clapped him on the arm, and headed for the door. "Let's go, kid."

* * *

Ratchet was in his office at the university hospital when Wheeljack knocked on the door frame. "Hey doc."

"Wheeljack," Ratchet said, voice warm, as he looked up. Then alarmed at what he saw, he growled in an entirely different tone of voice, "Wheeljack!"

Resonance, peering over Wheeljack's head, explained, "Kitchen accident. By now, I should know better than to let him cook unsupervised."

"..." Ratchet opened his mouth, but no sound came from his vocalizer.

"I offered to fix him myself, but he said you were more fun," Resonance added, with a mischievous flare to his field.

"Res!" Wheeljack smacked at him. "You weren't supposed to tell him that!"

"Why?" Resonance fended off his guardian's blows with a forearm. "I thought it would add to the enjoyment factor for Ratchet."

"Don't hit the kid!" Ratchet growled, rose, grabbed Wheeljack by his good ear fin, and dragged him off down the hall. Resonance, hands clasped together behind his back and an innocent smile on his face, followed them.

The noise that Ratchet was making - mostly inarticulate roaring mixed with the occasional clearly understandable curse word - combined with Wheeljack's yelping and the clatter of his feet as he was dragged off-balance down the hall. It was enough to alert the emergency room staff before they arrived, and Swoop peered around the corner.

"Ah." Swoop said, to Resonance, as Resonance followed his guardian and the university's CMO through the doorway, "Wheeljack still blows himself up."

"That he does." Resonance exvented.

Swoop mantled his wings for a moment, then shook his head. He said to Resonance, "I'm off shift now. Want to get a drink while Ratch fixes him up? Been meaning to meet you proper, anyway. We're kinda brothers."

Resonance hesitated, but Wheeljack was not badly hurt, and Ratchet was already bullying the engineer into a chair for repairs. He was about to agree when Wheeljack spoke up, "Hey, kid, get over here."

Swoop and Resonance both looked in his direction. "Which of us?" Swoop asked, confused.

"Ah - the tall one." Wheeljack considered that statement for a moment, then clarified, "The tall _shiny _one."

Swoop chuckled. He wasn't quite as tall as Resonance, and he definitely didn't have his mass, but the dinobot was certainly a large mech. "Ratchet doesn't need help to fix you, Wheeljack. I think he could do it with his optics off."

"Oh, shut up." Wheeljack hunched his shoulders and glowered.

"Make me." Swoop challenged playfully.

"Resonance, I want you to watch Ratchet work."

"I didn't agree to an audience." Ratchet snapped.

"Kid should see a master at work." Wheeljack beckoned Resonance over with a wave of his hand.

Wary of the spiky, aggressive, field emanating from Ratchet, Resonance approached. He half expected the old physician to turn and throw something at him, but Ratchet simply looked up as he walked over, and grunted something inaudible. He did angle himself a bit to the side so Resonance could see what he was doing.

Resonance watched, quietly, as Ratchet numbed pain sensors and carefully cut away charred and non-viable protoform from Wheeljack's face to reveal the intricate wires, gears, cogs, and sensors underneath. Jackie sat calmly, his own field radiating as much good cheer as Ratchet was sending out cranky irritability.

Ratchet wielded the laser scalpel with the dexterity of an artist. He replaced the cracked optic lens first, then isolated the charred length of neural wire, and neatly severed the necrotic piece with two quick flicks of his fingers. He produced a replacement length of living metal from a growth tank that was close at hand. Resonance, who had performed this procedure himself many times, watched closely. Ratchet's skill was far greater than his own.

At this point in the repair, Resonance would have braided the ends of the neural wire together and then wrapped nanomesh repair tape around them to encourage natural healing. Ratchet, however, pulled thin polymer tubes from his subspace along with a small vial of conductive gel, and a propane torch. Ratchet injected the conductive gel into the tubes, fed either end of the neural wire into the tube, and then heated the polymer tube with the torch. It shrank, tightening itself over the end of the neural wires, and sealing in the conductive gel.

Resonance spoke hesitantly, for Ratchet's field still felt terribly vile. "What's the benefit of using a polymer tube like you just did over braiding and taping?"

"Less scarring, and less chance of a short." Surprisingly to Resonance, Ratchet's field smoothed out as he spoke. He pointed out another neural wire, the one that operated Wheeljack's left-hand optical shutter. The surgery had exposed it, though it had not been damaged by the blast. "See the scarring?"

There was an area that was thickened to three times the normal dimensions. Resonance recognized the location. "Yeah, I did that repair. A tire blew on one of the delivery drones and a piece of the rim laid his face wide open."

Ratchet rolled his optics. "I'm sure he wasn't watching the pressure when he was inflating it."

"Probably not," Resonance agreed. "And the tire was getting bald, too."

Wheeljack's vocalizer clicked like he wanted to protest their discussion of his accident-prone tendencies, but they both ignored him. Resonance was fascinated by the feel of Ratchet's field now that he wasn't in a viciously foul mood. It was strong, sharply focused, and deeply complex.

"That spot healed fine," Ratchet explained, "but see how thick the scar tissue is? Occasionally, it will grow so thick that it impedes the function of a joint or gear, or it may even affect flexibility. It may also be visible as an imperfection under the top layer of protoform, which is a consideration when you are doing facial repairs where the dermal layer will be exposed to sight. On the other hand - braiding and taping is a more durable repair. If Wheeljack were likely to go into combat within the orn, or was working in a harsh environment, I would not have used a gel tube. Until his own nanytes complete the repair, it will be prone to damage. I also don't use tubes for critical systems, because of the risk of failure before the repair is complete. That nerve wire -" Ratchet flicked it with a finger, "- if it fails, he just smiles crooked and drools when he fuels. If a nerve wire to his fuel pump fails, he could die. Get the difference?"

"Yes. I'd always braided and taped nerve wires because I knew the repairs were more durable." Resonance nodded slowly. "I never calculated the risk of an excessively large scar versus the risk of nerve failure before."

"Mmm." Ratchet reached up and started dismantling Wheeljack's head fin. "Let's see how you would repair this fin ..."

Resonance demonstrated, somewhat nervously, as Ratchet watched. Ratchet leaned back against the next berth over as he worked, but his optics were keen. Only once did he interfere, and that was simply to say, "Knot that electrical line through that hole before you solder it. Normally, I wouldn't bother, but Wheeljack has a tendency to stress test his systems beyond what anyone else would do. Anything you can do to reinforce things helps keep him out of my med bay."

"Ya know ya love me, doc." Wheeljack spoke up.

"Be still." Ratchet glowered at him.

Resonance, under Ratchet's watchful eye, then packed the wound with nanyte-infused mesh to promote healing, and glued a layer of artificial dermal protoform over the top of the whole mess. Only when Resonance was done, including neatly trimming the edges and dabbing everything with gel to prevent scarring, did Ratchet grunt, "Not bad."

"See, told you he was a smart one." Wheeljack grinned. "Res, 'not bad' is Ratchet-speak for 'damn fine job.'"

"Yeah, let's see you smile like that when the sensor block wears off." Ratchet scowled at him.

"I would not be as skilled at minor repairs if you were not _careless_," Resonance added, still irritated at his guardian over the entire affair.

Ratchet guffawed. The sense of amusement in his field was every bit as strong as his earlier anger. "From the mouths of babes ... so, Res, how are your flight lessons with Starscream going?"

"Fine. I've learned a lot from him. He's a good instructor. And I'm also enjoying my other classes, too."

Wheeljack clapped Resonance on the arm. "And he's humble, Ratch. First Aid told me that Res had the best marks on his class's first exam. His scores were perfect, including all the extra credit."

"I'm not surprised." Ratchet looked up at Resonance, expression slightly odd. Resonance couldn't figure out what Ratchet was thinking. His field now felt confused and chaotic, and then, abruptly, could no longer be detected. Ratchet had pulled it in with nearly the same level of control that Agility had.

"C'mon, let's go get a drink." Wheeljack slid off the exam table. "I could use one, and I burned dinner."

"Ah, ah, no." Ratchet stared at Resonance with optics that had gone just a trifle large.

"Ah, ah, yes. You work too hard!"

"No thanks to you!"

"And you need a break."

"I have exams to grade!"

"So I'll help you with them tomorrow. C'mon, doc. Swoop, back me up here. Docbot needs a break. He's been working too hard. I know, because he's _always _working too hard."

Swoop, who had been quietly sorting supplies across the room rather than leaving at what was supposedly the end of his shift, looked up with wide blue eyes. "Don't involve me, Ratchet gets revenge!"

"I do not!"

"You do too." Wheeljack laughed, even as he manhandled the CMO towards the door. "C'mon, let's go. Swoop, tag along. You know you want to."

"Fine." Ratchet shrugged his arm free. "Only because my options are to either physically damage you - which would create both _extra work _and _extra paperwork _\- or make a public spectacle of myself."

Wheeljack threw his head back and laughed, then propelled Ratchet down the hall with a friendly shove. Swoop shrugged and followed them. Resonance, bemused, trailed after the three older mechs. He asked his guardian with an encrypted comm, _:Should I give you and Ratchet some privacy?:_

_:What? No! The day I frag Ratchet is the day that Primus and Unicron bond. I love the mech, but ... euugh, I'd kill him in a relationship, and Ratch' doesn't do casual. Which is probably half the reason he's cranky all the time. He could _use _a good frag. Anyway, come with us.: _Wheeljack shot a look over his shoulder at his young ward. _:Resonance, I want Ratchet to get to know you. 'S what this is all about.:_

_:Oh. You didn't deliberately ...: _Wheeljack was devious enough that Resonance wouldn't put it past himself to accidently-on-purpose injure himself if it suited his purposes.

_:... Burn half my face off? Nah. I'da picked something less painful if it came to that. But it made for a handy excuse. Now just _hang out _and be your charming self. The docbot needs more friends, and I want you to learn from the best. Res, you're one of the most brilliant younglings I've ever known, and you can be anything you want to be in this world. Ratchet is to medicine what Starscream is to flying.:_

Resonance was dubious about Wheeljack's plan. It felt too manipulative for his taste. However, he decided not to protest for now - he'd see how things played out. After all, Wheeljack was right in that he could learn a _lot _from Ratchet.

And ... and, more importantly, he was fascinated by Ratchet. There was something about Ratchet that intrigued him, and made him want to know the old medic better. Behind that cranky, prickly, exterior was someone _interesting_.


	5. Chapter 5

Reconstruction

* * *

Chapter 5

* * *

The first time that Ratchet had ever met Optimus, he had still been Orion Pax. Orion, though young, had been visibly exhausted when he'd shown up in Ratchet's clinic. The reason for his weariness had quickly become evident when Ratchet learned that the young convoy-class mech was working a full shift on the docks as a laborer while simultaneously taking multiple classes at the university.

Orion had sat quietly, optics only half lit, while Ratchet had examined a work-related injury to his leg. He'd fallen into recharge during the repair. And then he had _protested _when Ratchet had tried to give him an orn off work to heal. "But they need me!"

"You broke your tibial strut in four places," Ratchet had growled at him. "You need time off. Besides - finals are coming up. This will give you time to study."

"Paid for, at my employer's expense."

"Yeah? Well, if Shockwave Industries had better safety standards, you would never have gotten hurt."

"I can do desk work." Orion had insisted, mulishly. Unfortunately, he'd also been right. His level of education was high enough that Shockwave _had _found him office work for the duration of his recovery, and he had not gotten the time off that Ratchet had tried to arrange for him.

When Orion had returned for a check-up at the end of the orn, Ratchet had asked, "How'd your exams go?"

"Good."

"Yeah? Bet they could have been better if you'd had _time off _to study," Ratchet had groused at him. "Shockwave's sent another two mecha to my clinic since your accident."

"My scores were perfect, Ratchet," Orion had said, with what would later become a familiarly patient tone in his voice.

"Fine. That means you didn't get enough recharge. You do realize that _slows your healing down_?"

"I ... know. But it will be worth it."

"Fine, fine, you're probably right. Can't fault you for your work ethic. - Do you need a refill on pain chips?"

The stubborn glitch had shaken his head slowly. Though Ratchet knew that he was still in pain, he refused them with a quiet, "No. I have some remaining. I need to be able to focus all the time. My studies require sharp attention to detail, and I will be returning to the docks shortly. It is, as you noted, not a safe environment."

"About that ... Shockwave is skirting just this side of legal on his workplace conditions. If he steps across the line ..."

"I'll let you know." A sudden, brief, bit of fire appeared in Orion's optics. "I don't want anyone else getting hurt."

That had been the first time he'd met the mech who would become Optimus. He had been a fairly ordinary patient, with an ordinary repair, but something about the quietly dignified dock worker had stuck in Ratchet's mind. He had been so very tired, and yet he had been working far harder than most to better himself. He had gotten perfect marks despite a painful injury and long hours at a job. Ratchet had duly been impressed.

Now, watching Resonance, Ratchet wondered about what could have been of Orion Pax had been born to a family of different means.

Orion had impressed Ratchet by seeking a degree in archival data management. It was a solidly middle class job classification- and one that was difficult, but not impossible for a dock worker to attain. Back then, despite being truly brilliantly intelligent, and even in a world with fewer restrictions on vat-born mecha, Orion would have had zero chance at finding the funding or the time to study a more challenging field.

He'd gotten his degree, of course, and had ended up working in the Iaconian archives. He had been content, for a time, and Ratchet had become his friend. Ratchet had often wished he could _more _than his friend, but the age difference between them had made Ratchet hesitate even then. Ratchet was thousands of megavorns old. Orion had been a scant forty or fifty vorns by the time he'd become an archivist and had again crossed (Senator) Ratchet's path. And there had also been the small matter of Orion's dear friend, a fiery femme of mixed-caste bloodlines who would later go by the name of Elita One.

Legend had Optimus and Elita as a bonded pair. The truth was that they had never been lovers, simply dear friends, but Elita had warned Ratchet off more than once. She didn't _like _him, and didn't think he would be good for Optimus. Ratchet had been inclined to agree with her, in that he didn't think he could be a good partner for anyone.

Orion had been happy in the life he'd made for himself, but he could have been so much more. Ratchet had known that then, and Resonance's progress now only proved what Ratchet had long believed/

Of course, he _had_ become so much more. He'd become Optimus Prime, hero and martyr, and the first true Prime in tens of generations.

But ... what if the Matrix had never claimed Optimus? What could he have become _without _the influence of that holy relic?

_Guess we get to find out now, _Ratchet thought, with no irony. He sat at the table, next to Wheeljack, and watched as Swoop taught Resonance the steps to one of the dances popular with younglings. It was fast paced and lively, and he couldn't help but think young Orion would _never _have had the energy nor the time to dance freely with another youngling.

"His grades are all perfect," Wheeljack said, also watching. "He's _so _smart."

"We expected that."

"_You _expected that. I've raised mecha ... like him, reformats, you know ... before. Some things are spark deep, and some come from environmental influences. I was never sure which was which with Prime." Wheeljack lifted one shoulder in half a shrug. "He has more of a sense of humor than Prime ever had, that's for sure."

"Oh, Optimus had a sense of humor." Ratchet let himself smile briefly. "He usually kept it to himself. Once you got him alone, and a couple of drinks in him, sometimes he chose to let it show. Funniest damn thing I ever saw was the time he cracked Prowl up."

"He made Prowl laugh?"

"Yeah. I don't even remember what it was he said, but it was the very first time I ever saw Prowl really laugh."

"Resonance can actually be a bit of a clown." Wheeljack grinned. "I've sort've ... encouraged ... him to be more outgoing."

"Not many people he could be outgoing with on Titan," Ratchet said, skeptically.

Wheeljack waved his hand dismissively in the air. "Oh, sure. We went human generations between visits from other Cybertronians. But there were _humans_ there, generations upon generations of them. Titan's domes have populations in the tens of millions of humans, and Res and I watched them grow from a few hundred scientists right after the end of our war. Res kept relationships with certain human families for centuries - tens of their generations. And humans, well, you know what humans are like. They live their lives with such enthusiasm. I see _their _influence in Res, quite a bit."

Ratchet frowned. "That would be very hard for me to handle ... they also live such short lives."

"You've had human friends," Wheeljack said, a bit blankly.

"And they _died_."

"Doesn't mean you can't love friends while they're alive, Ratch'. Would you prefer to have never _met _the Witwickies?"

"No." Ratchet growled, reluctantly.

"Or Optimus?" Wheeljack said, with a significant glance at the dance floor. Resonance was now dancing with a neon green and black flight frame femme. Resonance _loved _dance and music, even though Wheeljack had never seen Optimus so much as bob his head to a beat. (And he'd been exposed to plenty of music with Jazz and Blaster among his friends.)

"No." Ratchet sighed, and rubbed his chevron with two fingers. He took a long swig of high grade, then glanced out at the dance floor.

The femme was blatantly coming on to Resonance, with provocative moves and hands that were just a tad too _grabby _for decorum. Wheeljack, amused, waited to see what Res would do. He was reasonably sure Resonance wasn't attracted to her, but was simply dancing with her because she was a skilled partner.

"That flitterglitch is Groove's kid, by the way." Ratchet rolled his optics.

"_Groove's_?" Wheeljack said, incredulously. He regarded the femme's paint job. "No, wait, that makes sense. The old hippie's kid is into punk."

Ratchet snorted a laugh into his high grade. Well, he had lived on Earth through the 1980's. Resonance, for his part, seemed to have settled on politely ignoring the femme's fingers as they wandered down his chest, finding transformation seams and cracks in the armor.

"At least she's not Elita's," Wheeljack said, with a snicker. "Where is Elita, anyway? We should introduce Res to her."

"She's around. And you really think that would be a good idea?"

"Sure. See what happens."

"Like 'sure, let's see what happens' _never _gets you into trouble, Wheeljack." Ratchet growled at him with real irritation. "Elita's too perceptive for her own good. Or Res's."

The femme was practically humping Resonance's leg. Resonance was politely ignoring this. Wheeljack wasn't surprised. He had made sure that Resonance was no prude, and knew the facts of life. Had Resonance responded to her blatant advances, he would have considered it healthy, age-appropriate, and normal.

Wheeljack had raised a _lot _of younglings in his life and most of them would have been all over Groove's daughter by this point. However, it was clear that Res just wasn't interested in the little twit. Resonance was a deeply private and reserved mech, and not one prone to any displays of blatant affection.

Resonance wasn't entirely as innocent as Ratchet likely assumed. Wheeljack was well aware that the big shuttle had a few very close relationships with humans over the last handful of vorns, and, in fact, the death (due to old age) of his last close human friend had been part of the impetus behind their relocation to Earth.

When Wheeljack had noticed Resonance's romantic interest in the first of a handful of humans, he'd quietly upgraded Resonance's systems with a human-sized drone. The drone had a few modifications that he assumed Resonance had made use of, though he'd never found out for sure- Resonance just wasn't the sort of mech you could ask, "So, are you boinking your human partner with your cleaning robot?"

"Alright, I've seen enough." Ratchet snapped, jerking the inventor out of pleasant memories of the past. (He'd managed to keep a straight face while telling Resonance about the drone's "upgrades" but only barely. Resonance's expression had been priceless; if Cybertronians could blush, Res would have been every shade of tomato known to man.)

Wheeljack was surprised by the real flare of irritation in Ratchet's field. Ratchet stomped to his feet, and marched towards the dancing couple. Wheeljack shook his head, but didn't try to interfere. He'd have to tell Ratchet about the cleaning drone later.

Wheeljack leaned back to watch. He knew that Resonance could handle himself and would tell the femme to back off if she truly made him uncomfortable, but Ratchet was still seeing Resonance through an Optimus Prime shaped filter. Ratchet and the rest of Prime's inner circle had had been ferociously protective of Prime.

The other dancers parted like a wave around Ratchet. His field must have felt like a blunt weapon. Wheeljack winced, expecting Ratchet to physically rip into the femme, but she felt him coming, glanced over her shoulder, and then got out of the way with remarkable alacrity.

Ratchet then grinned up at Resonance - it was a sharp, biting expression, but it was a grin. Over the music and the tremendous noise of dancing robots wearing armor, Wheeljack couldn't hear what he said, but Resonance looked vaguely relieved, and offered Ratchet his hand.

What most people alive today didn't know was that Ratchet was _good _on the dance floor. The old doctor had once been known as much for his hard-partying tendencies as his skill in the operating theater, and he'd spent a _lot _of time in dance clubs. Ratchet was one of the oldest mecha alive now, but he was in very good repair, he'd avoided any major crippling injuries during the multiple wars he'd lived through, and he moved with the same smooth speed and rhythm as he always had.

Resonance's optics lit and he grinned with a very un-Optimus-like expression as Ratchet showed him a new step. (And it _was _a "new" step - something that the new generation of younglings had come up with. Wheeljack, bemused, realized Ratchet had probably been paying more attention to the latest dance trends than he'd ever admit.)

Delighted, Wheeljack started recording the scene. Jazz would want to see this. Pit, _Prowl _would want to see this. It was wonderful to see Ratchet enjoying himself. Resonance, for his part, was probably just happy to have a dance partner who would teach him new steps while keeping his fingers clear of Resonance's transformation seams!

* * *

Much, much, later, Resonance returned to his dorm. It was very late - or very early, depending on perspective - but tomorrow was the ornly two-day break, and there were no classes.

Anodyne was alone in the room, watching an earth show on the screen. Resonance glanced at it, and said, "Ah, Dimension Trek."

"You're familiar with it?"

"Yeah. I don't think the latest season has reached Cybertron yet, but I've got it on a chip if you want to watch it."

"No spoilers!" Anodyne held his hands up, fingers crossed in a warding gesture that Cybertronians had adopted from humans a long time ago.

"Okay. Let me know when you want it. I love human creativity."

"Mmm. I'm just bored. And hey, what's this about you and the Hatchet?"

"The Hatchet?" Resonance said, blankly.

"Gossip moves faster than the speed of light around here, kid." Anodyne waved a hand dismissively in the air.

"I do not understand the reference. Hatchet?"

"Ratchet's human name rhymes with the word for a small axe in English ..."

Resonance's eyes flickered for a second as he processed that. "Oh, I get it. That doesn't work translate well into Cybertronian - not too many people would call Ratchet a 'small axe.' Nothing about him is _small_."

Anodyne hooted. "So the rumors are true?! You, the doc?"

"What, what, what?" Resonance demanded, startled. "_What_? We just _danced, _Anodyne. That's it! Don't make innuendos where I don't intend them."

"That's the whole point of an innuendo, kid."

"Yeah, well, that one was rude." Resonance folded his arms across his chest and glowered down at the mech. "And we _just _danced."

"And I'm amazed you asked him again, given the way he shut you down the first time. So what is it, Res? Got a kink for medics? Or old mechs? He's handsome old frame, if you like 'em old enough to have known Alpha Trion himself, and I mean that literally."

"Pretty sure Alpha Trion's still alive, Anodyne."

"He is?" Anodyne said, blankly.

"I met him when I was a youngling. He dropped into Titan for a visit."

"How long ago was this? You're still a youngling."

"For two more orns!" Resonance glared. Anodyne was generally easy going and affable, but Resonance had discovered the hard way that the mech's sense of humor sometimes clashed with his own innate dignity in ways that reduced said dignity to a smoldering ruin.

"You are _so _much fun to mess with, you know. You really met Alpha Trion?"

"Yeah. He's still alive. Probably hasn't been back to Cybertron since the war, though. He's off on some personal mission - Wheeljack says, and I quote, that he's Cybertron's biggest self-sacrificing idiot after Optimus Prime, whatever that means."

Anodyne looked briefly scandalized, then shook his head and returned (much to Resonance's dismay) to his original line of inquiry. "So. You and old Ratchet. What's up with that? Why'd you ask him to dance _again_? You've got brass bearings, kid, I'll grant you that. Ratchet scares the electrons right out of my circuits and I'm not afraid to admit it."

"I didn't ask him. He asked _me._" Resonance sat down on his berth. "I think he was rescuing me, honestly. Verve - you that green and black femme with the spike through her tongue and the ornamental studded helm? She was dancing with me, and she was all hands. He cut in."

Anodyne whistled, low and impressed. "She's supposed to be something else in the berth. She's a vatling, but you'd never know it by the way she acts. Supposedly, she even berths with Rodimus."

"Yeah, well, the Prime can have her. She's not my type. Ratchet chased her off before I could figure out a polite way to tell her I wasn't at all interested in what she was offering."

"You don't like femmes? Femmes are _fun_, kid."

Resonance shook his head. "It's not that. It's just that she wasn't interested in _me_, she was just after a conquest."

"Oh, yeah, sure, half the campus is drooling over that pretty frame of yours. They haven't a clue that what's going on in that processor of yours is even more impressive than your looks, but you coulda had fun anyway. It'd be as much a conquest for you as for her. Pit, _I _wouldn't have turned her down."

Resonance sighed. He had, indeed, noticed the interested that the other students had in his appearance. The attention had felt strangely familiar, like what humans called deja vu. It was also entirely unwelcome and unpleasant. "It is just not my idea of a fun time, Anodyne."

"Seriously?" Anodyne gave him an incredulous look. "How do you even _know_? How much experience could you have had on Titan?"

"You're being nosy, Anodyne," Resonance rebuked, with a bit of irritation.

Anodyne snickered. "Virgin."

"So?" Resonance flicked his wings back, annoyed. He had never been with another mech, true, but he'd had multiple close relationships with humans. Some of those deep friendships had been far more than platonic, and two had lasted the (regrettably far too short) lifetime of the human in question. He still missed Piper with all his spark, even though she'd died several human years ago. After committing twice to relationships that had lasted the entire lifetime of his partner, he just was _not _interested in casual flings. "I'm not a _child_. I know what I like. Verve isn't even on my radar."

Anodyne stretched out on his berth and propped his head up with his hands. He look Resonance up and down pointedly. "You know, if you're looking for a good time with someone who's _not _just looking to grope your wings, I like you for your spark and your processor as much as I appreciate your plating."

"... What?" Resonance wasn't scandalized so much as just surprised. "'Dyne, what about Slamdance?"

"Ah, they won't care. Pit, they'd probably join in."

"I'll pretend I didn't hear that."

"Shame."

"You're just saying that to hassle me."

"Oh, probably." Anodyne stretched lazily. "Though the offer stands. - So, any idea why the doc's come to your rescue twice now? That's not really like him."

"Not like him?" Resonance said, puzzled. "It seemed in character to me. Oh, and by the way, he's fun to dance with, too. Good sense of rhythm and he doesn't stick his fingers under my armor."

Anodyne shuddered. "Oh, now there's an image I can't unsee."

"What?"

"Ratchet. Groping you."

"I don't think that's going to happen."

"Wonder what he'd do if _you _groped _him_. He's old, not dead, and you are hot stuff, kid."

"He would most likely smack my hand. And I have no intention of groping him."

"Yeah, that'd be _weird_. Gross!"

"It would be _rude_." Resonance corrected. "Can we change the subject, 'Dyne?"

"Yeah, yeah, sure. I'll have plenty of opportunities to pick on you later."

Resonance threw a stylus from his desk at Anodyne's head. "Aft."

"You know you love me."

"That does not mean you're not an aft."

Anodyne laughed and threw the stylus back at him.

* * *

Ratchet sat alone in his small apartment, staring into a glowing blue cube of Sideswipe's strongest highgrade.

He really, _really _needed to avoid the kid.

It wasn't the color of his plating, or the power in his frame, or the balance and grace with which he moved. It wasn't his wings, or the brilliant blue of his optics, or his powerful yet nimble hands. It was that _smile_. It was the warmth of his spark. It was the brilliance of his processor. It was his sense of humor. It was his sheer calm _groundedness. _

Ratchet was in trouble. He knew it.

A message dropped into his inbox.

"Ratchet, remember we saved his spark to give him a second chance. So now you need to suck it up and give him that chance. He deserves the best in everything. Including the best teachers and the greatest of friends. - Jackie."

Ratchet downed the entire cube of high grade in one long chug. He told himself that he didn't matter that he was attracted to the young mech. He had no more chance with Resonance than he had a long time ago with Optimus. He could, as he had with Optimus, channel that spark-deep desire into being the best damned friend, advisor, and mentor that he could be.

He got up and poured himself another cube of Sideswipe's finest.


	6. Chapter 6

Resonance

* * *

Chapter 6

* * *

Glyph grinned, watching as the tallest of her students crouched on his hands and knees and very carefully whisked dust aside with a brush smaller than his pinky. Resonance should have looked ridiculous, but he somehow managed to appear dignified even when he was crawling around in the dirt of an ancient, war-blasted library.

The other students were down in a trench nearby. She had hopes that the library's AI might be salvageable, since it was in the basement of a hardened building. The kids were trying to reach it.

Resonance, however, was too big for tunneling work. He was useful for heavy lifting, and his inclusion in the class had given them unexpected range for field work this year (he'd given the entire class of seven other students and Glyph a lift to the dig site this morning), but he just didn't _fit _in tight spaces.

"Hah." Resonance said, sitting up. He held a tiny object in the palm of his hand.

"What did you find?" She wandered over.

"Look at this. Golden age, correct?" His hand was a quarter the height of her entire frame. She was no combatant. She should have found him intimidating, but Resonance was just too _friendly_ to inspire any fear. He held his palm down low for her to see, and she rested her own hand casually on his index finger while she looked.

"Yep. Nice find." He'd dug an intact datapad out of the rubble. "We'll clean it up back in the lab and see if we can pull any data off it. Looks like it might have been from the library's entertainment section."

"Hey, Res, we could use some power lifting over here." One of the minibots in Glyph's class popped her head up out of the trench.

Resonance handed her the ancient datapad, then rose and ambled casually over to the trench. Glyph watched, smiling at the scene, as the big shuttle lay down on his abdominal plates and extended a long arm into the basement they were excavating. Hydraulics whined, and his wings lifted from his back in a reflexive response to the effort needed, but he pulled a large slab of metal out of the hole intact. The piece of crumpled duryllium probably weighed twice what the minibot femme did.

"Ooh, it's a piece of artwork." The femme student pointed out traces of an ancient mural on what had once been a library wall.

"Oh, that's one of Sunstreaker's." Unhappily, she realized that meant that she'd need to interact with Sunstreaker. Glyph found the artist-turned-warrior intimidating, to say the least, but he'd specifically asked to be notified if the class found any of his lost works. He was restoring the damaged pieces as they were located, with near obsessive determination.

"I love his work." Resonance crouched, frowning at the remnants of scraped and scuffed paint. "He has a such a sense of _motion_."

"He's scary." The student said, wrapping her arms around him.

"Surely he can't be that bad. He was an Autobot." Resonance peered at her.

Glyph concurred with her little student. She eyed Resonance briefly, then said, "Res, Sunstreaker's workshop is on the way to your guardian's apartment. You think you can fit that in your subspace and still fly?"

"The mural?" Resonance eyed the work. "Yeah, I can."

The minibot student giggled. "You know what they say about mechs with large subspace pockets ..."

Resonance's normally mild expression turned vaguely alarmed as he looked down at his smaller classmate. "I am completely unsure how to respond to that."

Glyph snorted a laugh, hearing the thinly veiled humor in Resonance's words. He wasn't as embarrassed as his expression would imply. However, he also wasn't being flirtatious. Half the students she knew had crushes on the big shuttle, and to her knowledge, Resonance had never responded to any of them. "Res, would you do me a huge favor and drop that mural off at Sunstreaker's the next time you visit Wheeljack?"

"Sure. I'd love to meet him." Resonance hefted the large slab of metal up in his arms. It disappeared into his subspace with an audible pop.

* * *

Sunstreaker heard the bells on his studio's front door jingle, and then very heavy footsteps enter. He scowled at the painting he was working on, wet paintbrush held in one hand. The tray of carefully blended paints beside the canvas was drying as he stood. Aside from the inconvenience involved in stopping, he had a _vision _in his head, and he was afraid he would lose it if he left his workshop to greet the visitor.

"Hello?" A deep, sonorous voice inquired. "Is anyone there?"

_Prime_? Sunstreaker thought, startled, before he remembered Optimus was long dead. For a moment, he'd been thrown back twenty vorns to the end of the war.

Curious now, he answered, "Give me a minute." He dropped the brush into a glass of solvent, snapped a cover over the tray of mixed paints, and padded over to the sink. He washed paint off his hands, checked his reflection in a mirror for any stray smears, then headed for the door the small studio that fronted his workshop.

The intruder, err, potential customer, was tall and broad, with upswept wings and long legs. Sunstreaker thought _yum_, and then got a second look at the mech's face, and felt his field, and realized he was rather young. Now feeling vaguely perverted for leching at the kid, he said, "I haven't seen you around here before."

"I'm Resonance - Wheeljack raised me."

"Oh, yeah, Sides said something about you dancing with the Hatchet yesterday. What do you want?"

"Why does everyone call Ratchet 'Hatchet'?" Resonance used the English version of the word, with a distinctly modern 36th century Earth accent. "He's really not that bad."

"You clearly haven't pissed him off sufficiently." Sunstreaker rolled his optics. He doubted the child had the funds to pay for a painting, and he had work to do. "You got a reason to be here kid, or you just gawking?"

"Well, I was admiring your work - I have for a long time - but I'm here because Glyph asked me to drop this off."

From what had to be a rather spacious subspace, the youngling pulled out a large and badly damaged mural. Sunstreaker blinked in surprise, then hastily stepped forward to help the kid carry the large piece of painted metal into his workshop. "I painted this ... Pit, several thousand of orns ago. Never thought I'd see it again. Where'd you find it?"

"At an archeological dig. I'm taking a class with Glyph - learning to recover lost data files, and conserving and archiving what we find. We were excavating a library that was bombed in the war."

"Yeah, yeah, in Tarn, right?" Sunstreaker ran a hand over the edge of the piece. The image - of a long-dead noble who had been a patron of the library in question - was scuffed and faded to the point where he could barely make it out. "I won't be able to restore this, but now that I've found the original, I will create a reproduction of it."

"You don't want to reproduce your works until you find out their fate?" Resonance said.

"Yes." Sunstreaker gave the kid a surprised look. Most people didn't understand his motives for asking for the return of badly damaged pieces. "All my paintings are one of a kind. If I reproduce a painting, and then it turns out the original wasn't destroyed ... it cheapens it, I guess. But I don't want my work lost forever, so if something is damaged past the point of repair, then I will paint it again."

"I can see the logic in that." Resonance flashed him a grin.

"So," Sunstreaker, feeling a little less grumpy about being interrupted, leaned against a table and regarded the tall flier with a speculative look. Perhaps this disruption wouldn't be so bad. "Old Jackie raised you, huh?"

* * *

"Ratchet _and _Sunstreaker?" Anodyne's leer greeted Resonance the instant he opened the door to their dorm room.

"Huh?" Resonance responded, then recovered and said, "Anodyne, nothing improper happened. I was just taking him a mural we found. Glyph sent me. I was the only mech big enough to subspace it."

"Sure, that's what they all say." Anodyne laughed.

"How do you even know about that?" Resonance gave him a suspicious look. He'd heard enough stories about Anodyne's parent, Soundwave, to come to an unsavory conclusion.

Anodyne snorted. "I'm a carrier, m'mech. Symbionts see all. And then they gossip about it. It's hard to tune the yackity-yack out when you're bonded to two of them."

"Oh."

Anodyne flung himself down on his bed. "Sunstreaker's gorgeous, isn't he?"

"I suppose." Resonance thought about the far older warrior. Nothing about him had piqued Resonance's interest, but he could see why Anodyne might like him. "He's very well built."

"Slamdance hates him, though. Apparently, Sunstreaker was an aft to them during the war."

"How's it going with you and Slamdance?" Resonance hadn't seen much of the twinned symbionts lately.

Anodyne hitched one shoulder up in half a shrug. "There's another carrier who's courting them now too. She's a lot older. I wouldn't blame them for choosing an older carrier with a career and history, but I hope we can stay friends."

"Oh. I'm sorry."

"Honestly, I was really astonished when Scout and Agility chose me." Anodyne leaned forward, shoulders suddenly hunching. "Particularly Agility. I thought for sure he'd _never _choose a carrier, any carrier."

"I'm sure they both had very good reason to choose you. From what I've heard, cybercats are in high demand, and I'm well aware that Agility is _extremely _picky about his friends."

Anodyne sighed. "I just hope I can live up to their expectations of me."

Resonance frowned. Clearly, Anodyne was in a maudlin mood, perhaps because of the new competition for Slamdance. Maybe a distraction would help. He was _just _about to suggest the dance club when the door slid open again and Agility trotted through the door. "Boss, Frenzy's looking for you."

"Why didn't he comm me?"

"You're in tro~uble, that's why. He's on a mission to locate you, not talk to you!" Agility laughed at Anodyne's suddenly dismayed expression. "According to the birds, your sire found out about your grade on that biochemistry test."

"That was last semester!" Anodyne stood up. "Scrap. I'm going to go make myself scarce until my sire cools off."

"Soundwave has a temper?" Resonance said, blankly. He'd never met the legendary Decepticon spymaster, but 'bad temper' didn't match the stories and historical accounts he'd heard.

"Soundwave's my progenitor. My _sire _has a temper. She'll skin me right out of my armor if she catches up to me before she has a chance to calm down." Anodyne caressed Agility's back briefly. "Thanks for the warning."

After Anodyne bolted out the door, Agility snickered. "Poor Anodyne. His family makes me glad I was created in a vat."

"They're your family now, aren't they?"

"Oh, sure, but I refuse to get sucked into their drama." Agility held his hands up, and Resonance scooped him up automatically. Agility snuggled into the crook of Resonance's arm with a sigh. "I like you, Res. You don't do drama, ever."

He wasn't sure how to respond to that, but he didn't need to. Agility didn't give him a chance to answer before saying, "Let's go do something."

"Like what?"

Agility shrugged. "Anything."

"What do you do for fun?"

The question genuinely seemed to surprise Agility. "Usually whatever the others want."

"Well - what do _you _like to do for fun?" Resonance persisted.

"Target practice," Agility said, after a moment of silence.

"Then let's go to the range."

* * *

Agility, somewhat to Resonance's surprise, was _very _good.

Iacon had a shooting range just outside the city limits. It was popular, and there were a number of mechs in the bays. Agility seemed to be known to the proprietor, who waved him in without more than a brief greeting (he didn't seem to expect a response back), but Resonance had to sign a few waivers of liability and read through the rules. When the owner learned that Res was still a minor by a few vorns, he also commed Wheeljack.

Finally, formalities concluded, Resonance was allowed to join Agility.

Agility had checked out a pulse rifle, and was neatly hitting the center of the target with each sharp blast of energy. He was able to shoot with such precision that the target only seemed to have one rather large hole through it.

Resonance rented a similar, albeit much larger, weapon - they only had a small selection of rifles in his frame size - and took up a position in the next bay. His clusters weren't nearly as tight.

"You're good," he said, conversationally to Agility.

"Built for it." Agility shrugged, as he changed his rifle's power pack. There was a charger beside his bay, and he stood on his tip-toes to insert the old pack into it.

Agility's brief comment got them quite a few stares. "It speaks!" A seeker two bays down exclaimed.

The little symbiont pressed his lips into a tight line, and didn't respond to the seeker.

Resonance said, mildly, "Of course he can speak."

"He comes here every couple of days, and he _never _speaks to anyone." The seeker flicked his wings up.

"Leave them alone, Corona." Ratchet's low growl came without warning from behind Resonance.

"Doctor!" The seeker nearly dropped his weapon in shock.

"There's no requirement that Agility babble like you winged flitterglitches." Ratchet snapped, crossly. Then, before the young seeker could respond, he turned his back on him and addressed Resonance. "Evening, Resonance. Didn't expect to find you here."

After a glance at Corona, who looked like he'd bit into something sour, Resonance said, "It was Agility's idea. Though I should practice more - I'm not the best shot."

"Let me guess - Wheeljack taught you?"

"Of course."

"Wheeljack takes the brute force approach." Ratchet rolled his optics. "He doesn't have to be accurate, because he's usually packing enough area-affect weapons for an entire division. Let's see you shoot."

Resonance nodded hesitantly, and lifted the rifle to his shoulder. After he'd squeezed off a few rounds, Ratchet grunted something that might have been approval. "Your technique's not bad, but - here, change your grip a bit. Like this."

Ratchet reached up, and wrapped long, nimble fingers around Resonance's elbow. "Tuck your arm in a bit. That'll help steady your stance."

Ratchet's touch was firm, and purely platonic. He proceeded to adjust Resonance's posture with a hand on his hip and a tug at his shoulder. "Now, I want you to close your eyes and feel the rhythm of your power plant. It creates just a little bit of torque, which translates to a small amount of sway in a mech as tall as you are. If your stance is otherwise steady, you can adjust for the that motion."

This time, Resonance hit the target dead center.

"Much better." Ratchet reached up again, and flicked a finger against Resonance's wing with just enough force to be annoying, without reaching the level of actual pain. "Tuck your wings in close to your frame. It's not an issue right now because it's not windy, but you want as little air resistance as possible. You should make your shooting stance a habit, so you don't forget when it matters."

Ratchet's field was warm against his back. Now that the medic wasn't bristling with anger, Ratchet felt comfortable and oddly familiar. Before coming to Cybertron, he'd only met the medic a handful of times as a sparkling - and Ratchet had been aloof and cool then. The sudden surge of deja vu was, therefore, startling in its intensity.

"You okay?" Ratchet asked.

"Yes ... yes, I am fine." He glanced down at Ratchet, who was looking up at him with an expression of real concern on his face. He must have betrayed his surprise at the familiarity of Ratchet's touch with a surge of shock in his field. "For a moment, I could have sworn we've done this before."

"Do I need to scan your processor for glitches, kid?" Ratchet said, but there was something akin to alarm in his field. It didn't match the teasing tone of his voice at all. Ratchet seemed like he was about to pull away, but then, after a sharp exvent, he held steady. "Let's see you shoot another round. Go until the power pack is exhausted."

His shooting was slightly less accurate this time, because Ratchet's proximity was distracting, for reasons that Resonance didn't want to examine too closely. However, it was better than before, and Ratchet grunted approval. "You'll never be a true long range sniper. You're too big, and that size and the sheer power in your hydraulics and power plant leads to too much random movement into your stance. Wouldn't suggest mnemosurgery as a career either, for the same reason. But for as big as you are, you are reasonably steady overall."

"Wheeljack does good work," he said, raising his voice a bit to be heard over a sudden volley of blasts from three shooting bays down.

"Yeah, yeah he does." Ratchet ran a hand over his face, exvented softly, and then said, "How are you at hitting moving targets?"

"Truly horrible."

"Mmm. Let's work on that."

* * *

Somewhat to his surprise, after shooting for a few hours, Ratchet hesitantly asked him out for a meal. Mindful of the small friend who'd come with him, he said, "Sure, if Agility can come."

He halfway expected Agility to demur, or worse, bolt, but Agility simply held his arms up and Resonance scooped him up and deposited him on his shoulder.

Ratchet grinned. "Sure. Agility, you remember me, right?"

Agility nodded, which was more interaction with strangers than Resonance was used to seeing from him.

Ratchet explained, "I helped rebuild his frame after he was found. He put the whammy on me a few times, too, in revenge for my effort. But we got through that, didn't we?"

Agility shyly smiled, but said nothing.

"Glad he's found a friend in you, Res." Ratchet walked beside the taller shuttle as they headed for the range's exit. "And Agility, I'm glad to see _you _making friends, beyond Soundwave and his clan. Anodyne's a good kid, but I like seeing you out and about with other people."

Agility didn't really answer that, but Ratchet didn't seem to expect a response. Agility was starting to draw his field in, however, and had gone tense and quiet on Resonance's shoulder. Resonance reached up and rested a gentle hand on his new friend's tiny shoulder. "I like hanging out with Agility. He's good company."

"He talks to you, doesn't he?"

"Yeah."

"I'm not surprised." Ratchet flashed Agility a grin. "Resonance is easy to talk to, isn't he?"

Agility bit his lip, then nodded slowly.

_:You okay with this?: _Resonance asked Agility on a close-range encrypted comm. _:I can take you home if you want.:_

_:I like Ratchet. He's honest.: _Agility's response took a moment. _:And I like hanging out with you. I don't want to leave.:_

_:Good, because I enjoy time with you, as well.: _

In his peripheral vision, he saw Agility shyly smile.

Ratchet led the way to a small restaurant near the range. It was on at the edge of the bluffs that overlooked the badlands where the fliers practiced, and had a nice view. It was also notably quieter than the club that the students frequented, with old Earth tunes playing over speakers and no dancing. The staff seemed to know Ratchet, and waved him to a table near a window.

"Your usual?" A waiter asked Ratchet, after they'd studied the menu. The waiter set a tray of rust sticks and assorted mineral dips down on the table.

"Yeah."

"I'll have double size fizzy high grade, with a pinch of carbon. And a plate of jellies rolled in magnesium shavings." Res hesitated, unsure how to handle ordering for Agility.

_:Can you tell him I want a small plate of sulphur jellies?:_

_:Anything to drink?:_

_:Just mid grade. Even their smallest serving of high grade would be too much for me.:_

_:Want a little bit of mine?:_

_:Sure. I like that fizzy stuff.:_

"Agility," he gestured to the symbiont, who was still seated on his shoulder, "wants sulphur jellies, and mid grade. And can you bring an extra empty shot glass? He'll share my high grade."

The waiter peered at Resonance's passenger. "Is that a sparkling?"

Ratchet snorted. "He's probably older than you are, kid. That's a symbiont."

"I - are you a _carrier_?" The waiter said, in surprise, to Resonance.

"I am a shuttle frame. Agility is a friend of mine."

"Oh. He's unattached, then?"

Ratchet exhaled sharply through his vents, in apparent aggravation. "He's happily bonded to a carrier named Anodyne, who happens to be Soundwave's son. That _doesn''t _mean he can't have friends and a life of his own. Agility is just as capable of independent thought and action as any other mech."

"Oh." The waiter blinked. "That's cool, I guess."

After the young waiter had left, Agility said softly to Ratchet, "Thank you."

Ratchet gave him a surprised look, and his armor visibly settled. Agility ducked his head and wouldn't meet Ratchet's optics. Ratchet said in a tone that was nearly as soft, and somehow vaguely embarrassed, "You're welcome."

Resonance, for his part, couldn't shake the sense of familiarity. It was as if he'd heard Ratchet wound up into similar tirades, even though he barely knew the mech. He studied Ratchet, taking in his stern features: strong jaw, sharp optics, and optic ridges that seemed to be perpetually tilted down to match his ever-present scowl.

That expression was matched by a sturdy, heavily built frame. Warframed medics were designed for power and durability, and Ratchet was no exception. His armor was heavy, his hydraulics oversized, and his struts twice as thick as most mecha of a similar height. The strength of his field was a direct reflection of the size of his power plant, which was even larger than Resonance's. That enormous power plant, and the sheer ruggedness of his frame, meant he was far heavier than he looked.

Yet like most medics, he had nimble hands, and highly mobile arm joints. His optics were larger than average as he needed sharp vision, without distortion and with keen color discrimination, for certain medical procedures. He was mostly colored the usual white that most medics preferred, but his red highlights were the exact same exact metallic shade as Resonance's.

"What are you looking at?" Ratchet growled.

Resonance blinked, then said apologetically, "I am sorry. I didn't mean to stare."

"Something wrong?" Ratchet glanced down at himself. "I was in surgery earlier, but I swear I got all the energon and grease off my plating."

"No, nothing is wrong. It is just that you seem so very familiar. I didn't mean to stare. It is most likely my imagination. Wheeljack has told me a lot about you."

Agility, on his shoulder, snickered.

"And what are _you _laughing at, runt?" Ratchet snapped.

Agility stuck his tongue out at Ratchet.

Ratchet sputtered, and then flicked a fragment of a rust stick at Agility with his thumb and forefinger. He missed, since the stick wasn't exactly aerodynamic and Agility was a small target, and the rust stick bounced off Resonance's forehead before landing on the table.

Resonance flicked it back. Ratchet ducked, but not fast enough, and the rust stick clattered down into a crack between his armor.

Agility laughed again as Ratchet awkwardly fished the fragment of snack out of his armor.

"You are trouble." Ratchet pointed a finger at the symbiont. Then he ate the piece of rust stick, pointedly chomping on it with great enthusiasm and somewhat impolite levels of noise.

* * *

Ratchet, some hours later, stepped into his small apartment. He was humming cheerfully, and couldn't remember the last time he'd enjoyed a meal quite so much. Resonance was fun, and Resonance and Agility were adorable together. If he wasn't mistaken, Agility had a huge crush on the big shuttle. Resonance was oblivious, which made it all the more amusing.

A shadow detached from a corner of his apartment. A blue visor lit.

Ratchet startled, armor clamping tight and combat subroutines booting with the startling swiftness that only a mech designed from the protoform out for war could manage. His blaster was in his hand and his hydraulics fully powered before he even registered _who _the stranger was.

Jazz smirked at him.

Ratchet put the gun away, forcefully deactivated his combat readiness, and glared. "Never heard of _privacy_, Jazz? That door was locked."

"Was it? Ah didn't notice."

"If this is about me and Resonance, trust me, I have not forgotten who he is - or his relative age. _Nothing _will ever happen between us."

Jazz gave him a startled look. "Last ah heard, you were spittin' acid at the kid whenever he came within loogie distance."

Ratchet fluffed and pointedly relaxed his armor. "I am making an effort to be friendly with him."

And that effort was, he thought ruefully, becoming less and less. Resonance was just so damned likable. He looked forward to finding another excuse to hang with the kid. And, he reminded himself firmly, do nothing more than _mentor _him.

"Is it working?" Jazz asked, with evident fascination.

"As long as I keep telling myself he's something akin to Optimus's child and not, well, you know ... yes. He's a very personable youngling, and I enjoyed myself today. I ran into him at the range and we went out to dinner later, with his _friend _along."

"That's good to hear. I'm glad you're getting out." Jazz tilted his head with interest. "How's his aim?"

"Given his height and the size of his power plant, and the fact he's not built for stability? Not bad at all. I gave him a few pointers. He'll never be as accurate in a standing position as say Bluestreak or Percy, because they're _built _for it, but he's got the zen quality you'd expect and that helps him. He'll probably be able to outshoot me - or you - with a few vorns of practice."

"Optimus was never all that good of a shot," Jazz mused. "He tended to take the brute-force approach to killing things. Honestly, that worked just fine for him, since he had the size and the weapons for it."

"Resonance, with some training and dedication on his part, could very well be a better fighter than Prime was. He has a better quality frame, in far better condition. Optimus had so many repairs towards the end it was all I could do to keep him standing plumb and walking in a straight line. And Optimus's underlying design was that of a laborer. The Matrix and Alpha Trion could only upgrade so much. Say what you will about Wheeljack - he does know how to build one hell of a custom warframe. Under the wings and flight kibble, Res is all warrior. He just doesn't realize it yet."

"True. Wheeljack wants what's best for him, and if t' kid gets called by the Matrix, it's to his benefit to have t' best design he can. Ah was always worried that femoral strut of Prime's was going to crack in the middle of one of his wrasslin' matches with Megs. Ah think ya welded it up ten, maybe twelve, times."

"Fourteen. And it ended up twisted fifteen degrees out of true by the end of the war, and there wasn't a thing I could do about it short of replacing the entire leg - which we didn't have the time or resources for - because every single one of his hydraulic lines in that leg were also bent, twisted, torqued, stretched, or flat out nonfunctional. That used to throw the alignment of his back struts off. He was always in pain from the secondary orthopedic issues and he never complained once."

"He wouldn't." Jazz agreed.

Ratchet padded to his kitchen cabinet and pulled out a large container high grade. "Want some?"

"Nah, this's an official visit, actually."

"Ooh, I'm honored. Roddy finally remembered I exist?" Ratchet rolled his optics, and decanted a cube for himself.

While he was pouring, Jazz was silent. This was uncharacteristic enough that Ratchet finally turned around to face him, optics narrowing with concern. The mech who faced him had transformed from his normally happy-go-lucky friend to the former - but still deadly dangerous - head of Autobot Special Ops. The difference wasn't even subtle. This Jazz, rarely seen, moved with the same uncanny grace of an earthly predatory cat. His expression was serious, jaw set in a hard line, and visor glittering with unreadable energy.

Ratchet sighed, and drained his cube in one long gulp. Suitably fortified, and not the least bit intimidated by one of the most dangerous mechs to have ever lived, he barked, "What?"

"The Prime authorized me to reactivate you to the miliary." Jazz folded his arms across his chest. There was a subtle difference in his phrasing that only those who had fought in the war would recognize. 'The Prime' was Rodimus. 'Prime' used alone, without an article before it, was - and always would be - Optimus.

"Hnnh."

"Prowl's worried." Jazz paced restlessly. "And when Prowl worries, I worry. There's trouble coming."

"Quints?"

"Among others. We are galactically unpopular, and we are weak. Rodimus wants us to send a delegation to Earth, to secure help from the humans."

"And I assume you have an agenda also?"

"Both of us do." 'Both' was undoubtedly Prowl and Jazz, working as a combined team. Together, the two of them were largely responsible for Cybertron's continuing existence in the face of outside threats. Rodimus handled civilian economic development, and he had become passably good at it over the last twenty vorns.

However, Prowl and Jazz - along with Starscream, who was surprisingly dedicated to protecting the future of Cybertron - dealt with military issues. Roddy had only been a grunt during the war, and had no innate talent for interstellar politics. Neither did Prowl and Jazz, exactly, but they were at least good at threat identification and mitigation.

Jazz's idea of threat mitigation, which was "kill it with fire" and explosive variations thereof, was often delivered by the Skywarp Express. This had not helped their reputation as a race. To Ratchet's knowledge, nothing he and nor Jazz's operatives had done had been unwarranted or unprovoked, but nonetheless Cybertron had lately been accused of outright terrorism by its enemies.

Nope. They didn't have many friends, except for Earth. Humans had been their staunch allies for so many human generations that human historical documents barely remembered the beginning of that alliance

"I want Res off Cybertron." Jazz said, bluntly. "Wheeljack didn't ask before bringing him back, or we would never have allowed it."

"Explain." Ratchet's optics narrowed.

"How many mechs with type alpha sparks are currently alive?"

Ratchet shrugged. "Enough, I assume."

Jazz stabbed a finger in the general direction of Res's dorm. "Three, that we know of, and we've been testing every youngling created for the last twenty vorns, vat or primally born. They are Roddy, Ultra Magnus, and Resonance. Ultra Magnus has already been turned down by the Matrix. Resonance is our _only _option to host the Matrix if anything happens to Rodimus, and it's tactically stupid to have him in the same _star system _with Roddy, nevermind the same city. We arranged for him to grow up on Titan with Wheeljack for very real reasons that go far beyond just wanting the ghost of Prime to have a nice childhood."

"I didn't realize there were only three." That chilled his spark. He'd assumed there would be a few score in the general population.

"Alpha sparks tend to be heroic idiots who get themselves slagged at the first available opportunity." Jazz rolled his optics. "And as a species, we don't exactly have a rapid reproduction rate. Alpha sparks are randomly formed, of course, but it seems like Lady Luck hasn't been on our side and none of the baby bitlets are alphas. It's all a numbers game, but until some poor slagger gets created with the right spark frequency, Resonance is our _only _potential Matrix bearer."

"There might be some among the adults that survived the war." Ratchet frowned. "It was never routine to test vat born mecha before the war, because nobody expected a vat mech to become Prime. And then there came a librarian named Orion ..."

"Yeah, but we ain't found one among the vatlings yet." Jazz shrugged. "I halfway expected Silverbolt to test positive, but he's not. I checked him m'self."

"Resonance is enrolled in the university. He's making a life for himself. You can't expect him to drop all that."

Jazz sighed. "We thought it might work out. Things have changed. I want him offworld. _Now_."

"How are we going to explain that to him?" Ratchet's thoughts were in a whirl. There was a sharp urgency to Jazz's field. Something big was up.

"Tell him the truth?" Jazz said this with a dangerously sharp smirk. Jazz had never been enthusiastic about the idea of hiding Resonance's true origins from him. Jazz had always felt that Resonance would figure it out sooner or later, given his keen level of intelligence and intuition. Ratchet agreed with him, but since the kid _was _living an innocent life as a normal youngling, he didn't want to see it Res's life disrupted now.

"No!" Ratchet said, vehemently, in the response to Jazz's suggestion.

Jazz's only reaction to Ratchet's swift reaction was a grin. Ratchet realized that Jazz had been needling him, and glowered at the smaller mech. "Not the whole truth, of course. Just tell him that slag's about to hit the fan, and we need him to take the delegation to Earth."

"But what about his classes ... and mine? I am my department head, as well as an instructor." Ratchet asked, then sighed as realization struck. "There isn't going to be a university to take classes at, is there?"

"Likely not." Jazz shrugged. "Delegation will be you, me, Soundwave and his entire family because that was the only way I could get Soundwave on board, plus Starscream, and Starscream's brat and trine."

"Why are we sending _Starscream _to Earth?" Ratchet knew why he was being included. He didn't like it, but he did have political experience and he got along well enough with humans. (He missed Sparkplug even now.) Jazz would take point and serve as ambassador, however, and Soundwave was being included for his reconnaissance and defensive abilities. Soundwave's - and perhaps Anodyne's - symbionts would also be useful for working with humans due to their more approachable size, assuming someone kept a short leash on Frenzy and Rumble, and Ravage didn't maul anyone.

If Anodyne was along, that got them Agility, and the little mechling was a walking weapon Ratchet wasn't about to underestimate. He smiled, faintly. Resonance would be safer than most of them realized, with Agility around.

"I asked for Starscream because Res, according to Screamer, still flies like a brick. If they get into trouble, I want someone at his controls who can keep him from killing himself _and _the lot of you. Starscream wouldn't agree to it unless his trine and Quasar could come, and likewise for Soundwave. Also, Starscream's the highest ranking government muckity-muck that we can spare for negotiations with the humans. He's actually decent at politics, when he puts an effort behind it. He's a sneaky, backstabbing, conniving little bastard, all of which are positive traits for a politician."

Ratchet, once a Senator, snorted agreement. Jazz had just described most of his political colleagues. Many of them made Starscream seem like a candidate for the next Primacy, in comparison.

"Does Starscream know who Res is?"

"I've never told him, but he smirked at me when I told him Res was the only shuttle we could spare for the delegation. By the way that is - also - completely true about Res being our only free shuttle. And Screamy's not real happy about being sent off to Earth when there's trouble coming, but he groks that we need human help if we're going to survive as a species."

Ratchet rubbed his forehead with two fingers. "And if Starscream has figured it out? If I had my preference, that winged flitterglitch would never be within a few light years of Res. He's too smart for his own good, and he's manipulative as hell."

"Res or Screamer?" Jazz smirked.

"Both." Ratchet snorted. "Don't underestimate Res."

"I never do." Jazz's smile vanished as swiftly as it had appeared. "And I'll repeat that - don't underestimate Resonance. He can handle Starscream. And Ratch, you're third in command for the mission. Starscream's my second. Can you deal with that?"

"I'll deal."

"Good mech." Jazz clapped him on the arm. "Go get Res. I'll round the others up. This is almighty urgent, so don't dawdle, but do get yourself a really complete medical kit. You may need it, I'm afraid."

* * *

After arranging for his wartime portable medbay to be pulled out of storage and delivered to the runway, and stuffing his subspace completely full with concentrated energon rations and assorted medications, fluids, and parts for routine maintenance (Earth's dirt and astoundingly high level of biomass was hell on air filters), he headed over to the dorm. He hesitated outside Res's door for a long moment before resolutely pinging him. He just didn't like this - he wanted to scream angry denial to the winds. He just _didn't _want to be facing another war!

The door opened to reveal not Resonance, but Anodyne. The brown and black carrier regarded Ratchet with open surprise. "Doctor. Can I help you?"

"You need to go talk to your progenitor." Ratchet said. "Now."

"Okay, I didn't do anything. My sire already knows about my test results ..."

"You're not in trouble, Primus! Collect your symbionts - Slamdance, too, if you can. You've got a rifle, right?"

"Of course. What's going on?"

"Take it with you. And any spare energon rations you've got."

Agility rested a hand on his carrier's knee, and peered around Ratchet's leg. In a soft voice, the symbiont spoke aloud for the first time in Ratchet's hearing. "War?"

"Perhaps. I don't know the details yet."

"Slagging fragging mother of Unicron ..." Anodyne whirled back into the room. Ratchet followed him into the room. Resonance was seated at his small desk, large frame folded into an undersized chair. He looked at Ratchet with open curiosity.

"What is going on, Ratchet?"

"We need to talk."

Anodyne stormed out of the room a second later, Scout and Agility trotting after him. Ratchet waited until the door shut, then drew a deep draft of air through his cooling intakes. "Resonance. We need your help."

"Sure." Resonance's optics were open and unguarded, though clearly worried about Anodyne's reaction and Ratchet's earlier words to the young carrier. "What's going on?"

"I'm being sent to Earth, along with a delegation of others. We need a shuttle."

Resonance pressed his lips together, and his optics narrowed. "By the time I get back, the semester will be _over_."

"I realize that."

"Who's teaching _your _classes while you're gone?" Resonance had gone from upset to highly suspicious in a nanoclick. He was smart enough to realize that Ratchet wouldn't leave his own responsibilities behind without a very, very, good reason.

Ratchet could only shrug. "We need to leave within the hour."

"_What_?" Resonance rose. Ratchet took a step back. Resonance wasn't exactly a threatening mech, but Ratchet's head only reached to just above his elbow. "What is so slagging urgent that we need to leave without warning, within the hour ..."

And then Resonance fell silent. Sharp blue optics studied Ratchet, keenly. Ratchet waited, an eerie sense of familiarity tearing at his spark. He was not surprised when Resonance curtly nodded. "Very well. Will Wheeljack be going with us?"

"... No." Ratchet's shook his head. "I don't have all the details yet from Jazz. He will brief us after we depart. However, I expect Wheeljack's rather, ah, unique talents will be required elsewhere, very shortly."

Anyone else who knew Wheeljack might have found amusement in that comment. Resonance just looked worried.

"He's a big boy. Jackie knows how to take care of himself, and he's too valuable to risk on the front lines." Ratchet gripped Resonance's forearm in what he hoped was a reassuring touch. "C'mon. What do you need to pack?"

"I've barely _un_packed," Resonance said. It wasn't exactly a whine, but he definitely sounded like a displeased youngling when he said it. Then, with efficient haste, he started pulling crates out from under his berth. Half were full of datapads; Ratchet made no objection when the kid sub-spaced them. It was a long flight to Earth, and he hoped that Res was willing to share his entertainment media.

The rest of Resonance's belongings seemed to be tools and scientific instruments. Ratchet's optics rose when a mass spectrometer disappeared into the shuttle's enormous subspace, and stayed up when an electron microscope was followed by a small emergency clinic's worth of parts and medical supplies. Resonance apparently carried more spare parts around than Ratchet did. Combined with Ratchet's own portable clinic, they would be well equipped to treat a small battalion.

Hopefully it wouldn't come to that.

On the other hand, Resonance had Wheeljack as a guardian. His first aid kit was probably not overkill given the sorts of repairs that Wheeljack frequently needed.

A survival kit was next - enough energon cubes for a small fuel depot, an inflatable insulated hab-suite, thermal insulating foil, an energon converter, and a couple different variations of oxygen generators. There were also mineral supplements and several crates of concentrated solid energon rations.

_Shuttle coding_, Ratchet realized. That was something that Res had and Optimus didn't, though Res's base coding was entirely compatible with his spark's inclinations. Res was programmed at his very core to protect his passengers. The first aid kit and survival gear was meant not just for Res and Wheeljack, but for any mecha he was carrying with him.

The final item that Res pulled from under his berth (and Ratchet was beginning to suspect the berth had its own subspace field) was a crate of weapons. Ratchet was unsurprised to see that the weapons included an energon sword and a molecular dagger. However, Res's next words startled him. "I don't own a ranged weapon."

"... what?" Ratchet blinked.

Resonance shrugged. "I grew up in the domes on Titan. If I wanted to practice shooting, I could borrow a weapon from Jackie, but nobody - not even Wheeljack - would be stupid enough to fire a blaster in a dome. Never needed or wanted one of my own."

Ratchet snorted his opinion of that, and reached into his own subspace. He always had an assortment of weapons, some of them integrated with his frame. He handed Resonance one of his blasters and a handful of power packs. "Start carrying this with you everywhere. I'll call Ironhide and he'll get you a laser rifle and a pulse cannon before we leave. We can have some frame-mounted guns and missiles installed for your alt mode at one of the orbital stations before we depart Cybertron's system."

"Are things really that bad?"

Ratchet, a veteran of several wars, snorted. "It's always that bad, kid."

"Oh."

Resonance looked around the room. His gaze fell on his homework; it appeared he was dissecting a scrap fuel pump for First Aid's class. "I suppose I don't need to finish that."

"Leave it." Ratchet caught Resonance's elbow. "C'mon. I don't know entirely what's up, but when Jazz says it's urgent, it's _urgent_."

* * *

The others were waiting for them at the shuttle port when they arrived on foot. It was an odd group that, only twenty vorns ago, would have been sure to degenerate into a small battle right on the spot.

Time had healed a lot of wounds, Ratchet reflected. Jazz was actually _teasing _Starscream, and getting flirtatious wing-fluttering as a response. Primus help him, if he had to watch the two of them flirt in close quarters for the Earthly-month long trip, he'd strangle them both himself.

Jazz-the-saboteur scared Starscream mute. Jazz-the-playboy was _exactly _Starscream's type, aside from his notable lack of height - and Jazz's personality always made him seem bigger than he really was. Starscream seemed to have a short memory for personal trauma, and he hadn't seen evil-Jazz recently.

In the distance,at the head of the line of mechs waiting to take off, a large suborbital air transport transformed. Ratchet glanced over as half a dozen mecha with military upgrades clambered aboard. The transport taxied towards the end of the runway. Several other small groups awaited their turn at launch ahead of the transport.

While flight frame mechs could easily launch with foot thrusters and then transform in mid air, they couldn't do so with passengers. The runway was used for mecha who were flying with friends or paying customers. As Ratchet surveyed the waiting line, it seemed like a very normal afternoon. The assembled mecha included a few air taxis with small groups contracted for intercity travel, one bored-looking seeker with a minibot companion, the big air transport, and just behind the transport, Skyfire.

It was not unusual to see Skyfire waiting in line at the runway, as he was one of the few shuttles with orbital capability who lived full time on Cybertron. He frequently made small hops to the moons or orbital space stations with researchers or students from the university, as well as regular suborbital flights between cities.

However, Skyfire had Prowl, Rodimus, and Ultra Magnus with him, and Skyfire looked as serious as Ratchet had ever seen him. Ratchet wondered if it was the effect of his company, or if he knew what was up (which Ratchet still didn't). Then Ratchet noted that Skyfire was sporting some new wing-mounted pulse cannons and laser rifles among his kibble and decided that, yes, Skyfire probably had at least something of a clue and he didn't look at all happy about it. Also, Roddy looked unusually grave.

With a huff of aggravation (_he _still didn't know what was going on), Ratchet turned his attention to his travel companions.

Soundwave was as dour as Ratchet had ever seen him, and had his symbionts packed away in his chassis. Ratchet's passive scanners could detect six spark pulses in addition to Soundwave's own.

Soundwave's bondmate, a pearly white and gold femme carrier named Moonlight, greeted him with a nod and a taut smile. She had a single symbiont, a rather severe looking silver cyberhawk. The cyberhawk perched on her shoulder and mantled his wings and hissed under his breath at Resonance and Ratchet as they approached, but said nothing actually intelligible.

Soundwave simply looked his way, but Ratchet wasn't expecting much more of an acknowledgement from the former Decepticon spymaster. It had taken him a long time to learn that there was nothing personal about Soundwave's extreme reserve. It was just the way the mech was wired.

All four of Soundwave's younglings were present. Anodyne, the eldest, had Agility on his shoulder, and Scout at his heels. The other three - Catalyst, Mercury, and Brissant- were clustered close to Soundwave. They were too young to bond with symbionts, though all were in their final frames. Brissant, the youngest, had a cybercat sparkling in her arms.

"Hello, Brissa. That's a cute sparkling. Where's her creators?" Ratchet asked, for lack of anything else to say.

"Dead." Brissant stroked the kitten's back. The kitten responded with rapid binary clicking that was too full of sleepy static to be understandable. Brissant said firmly, "We're the only family she has. She's coming."

Moonlight's cyberhawk hissed again.

"Fine, fine," Ratchet didn't care. The kitten was barely the size of his hand. He didn't think she'd be much of a drain on their resources. Slamdance, also not bonded nor related to Anodyne, was _far _larger, but Ratchet figured Slamdance might actually be useful in a fight. It was why he'd told Anodyne to bring the twinned symbionts.

Slamdance was currently talking to Jazz. Jazz's expression was grave, his demeanor entirely professional.

"You don't have weapons in alt mode, do you?" Jazz said, without preamble, as Resonance approached the pair.

"... No." Resonance admitted.

Starscream, walking up behind Jazz, snapped. "And whose oversight was that?"

"Not an oversight." Resonance fluffed and relaxed his armor in the Cybertronian version of a shrug. "Long range frame-mounted Cybertronian weaponry is forbidden on Titan."

"Which makes sense, from the standpoint of humans. It wouldn't take much to poke a hole in a dome, and that could lead to horrific death tolls." Ratchet backed Resonance up.

In the distance, the big suborbital transport he'd seen earlier began powering his engines up. The low roar of jets ramped up to a powerful whine as the RPMs increased.

"Humans." The speaker wasn't Starscream, though the dismissive voice tone was definitely familiar. Quasar stalked over, optics glittering with anger. "I am pulled from my studies because my _progenitor _feels the need to take a vacation to a system with puny fleshling vermin ..."

Starscream _thwapped _his son up the back of the helm so hard that the young mech's optics glitched. The hollow sounding _clang _reverberated across the tarmac. "You've been watching Megatron's speeches."

"Actually," Jazz said with a grin, "I was just thinking he sounded like _you_."

"And who do you think I was mimicking?" Starscream said, with an irritated flick of his wings. "All a survival strategy, I assure you. Quasar, this isn't a vacation and don't underestimate the humans. Megatron did, to his demise."

"Besides, Quay," Skywarp put in with a smirk, "You're flunking xenobotany for the second time. What studies, again?"

Quasar glared at his sire, who answered the glare with a broad, teasing, grin.

"Not funny!" Quasar snapped, sounding genuinely hurt.

Ratchet was surprised when Resonance volunteered, "I am good at xenobotany. We have a long flight ahead of us. Perhaps I could help you with your studies?"

Quasar stared for a long, silent, moment at the big shuttle. Resonance smiled uncertainly. Ratchet fought the urge to slap a hand to his face. Resonance meant well, but like his past reincarnation, he had his incredibly clueless moments.

"By the time we get back, the semester _will be over_." Quasar ground out.

Skywarp said, with a chuckle, "Fortunately for you, kiddo. You can take the class again. Third time's the charm, eh?"

"And I can help you study for it in advance. You have the syllabus, right?" Resonance said, earnestly. "That way, it will be easy when you return."

Quasar snarled, "Are you an idiot?"

Resonance blinked, clearly surprised by the venom. "Not according to my test results."

"Quay," Skywarp clapped his son on the arm, and said over the noise of Starscream's laughter and Ratchet's snickering, "Don't antagonize our ride. Something I learned a long time ago - shuttles are bigger than you are, and they'll leave you behind if you piss them off enough."

Quasar shrugged free of Skywarp's hand. "I have wings too."

"Yeah, but I ain't paying for your fuel bill to get all the way to Earth on your own tanks." Skwarp affectionately draped an arm around Quasar's shoulders, despite Quasar's attempt to duck away. "C'mon kid, cheer up. Earth's not so bad. Wait'll you get to fly in an Earthly thunderstorm. It's an awesome thrill ride."

The air transport at the end of the runway powered up his engines and started to roll. A second later, he roared past them. Their group shuffled forward as line moved, and the air taxi that was next for takeoff transformed. So did Skyfire, and Prowl, Rodimus, and Magnus climbed aboard.

The conversation had stalled in the wake of the noise from the transport's launch. Resonance finally said, "I'm afraid my passenger hold isn't very big. You'll need to sleep in shifts if you want a berth, and there won't be much privacy."

"No worries, kid." Jazz said, genially. "We've all traveled in worse. At least you're better company than half the shuttles I've known."

"Remember Astrotrain?" Skywarp said.

"_Don't _remind me." Starscream rolled his optics. "Paying for my own fuel bills was preferable to riding in that ... creature."

"He had glitchmice." Skywarp informed the Autobots. All three seekers had their armor clamped tight to their frames in apparent memory of pest infestations. Ratchet, who'd dealt with the vermin many times as a medic, sympathized. Glitchmice were the cybertronian equivalent to human lice, and every bit as itchy and as tedious to get rid of. He'd run into glitchmice during the war that were resistant to every vermicide he'd known of, and which had required manual removal, one pest at a time. And they liked to get into the most _inaccessible _locations.

Ratchet's interface hatch tightened reflexively in memory of a patient with a particularly nasty infestation.

"I spent a lot of trips in Astrotrain in alt mode with all my vents shut tight," Thundercracker said. "One trip, Frenzy and Rumble traveled in my passenger seats. And they _behaved_."

Soundwave said, "Twins, capable of good behavior with proper incentive."

Starscream snorted a laugh at that. "Primus. That brings back memories. It's been forever since I've traveled with your troop of merry misfits, Sounders. I'm actually looking forward to it."

Ratchet, who had a very different perspective on Soundwave's notorious symbiont twins, said, "Soundwave, do warn them that I will _give _them incentive to behave if necessary."

"Noted." The carrier said, without any inflection in his voice. Ratchet had no idea if Soundwave was amused, worried, or dismissive.

A ground transport rolled up, towing Ratchet's portable med bay behind him. The entire clinic folded up and automatically transformed itself into a rather dense trailer. Jazz, seeing it arrive, let out a low whistle. "Now there's an antique. Haven't seen one of those in megavorns.

"It's been in storage since before we got stuck on the Ark." Ratchet patted the trailer, then paid the transport mech. "Everything still works. Good old Golden Age construction. Figured it might come in handy."

"Res, can you fit that thing in your subspace?" Anodyne sounded truly impressed.

Resonance squinted at it, and ran a few scans. "Yeah. It'll fit, but I'm filling up. I'll transfer it to my hold when I transform to save on power use."

"I swear shuttles have subspaces like Felix the Cat's bag," Jazz said, a comment that only got him a puzzled look from Anodyne. Ratchet snorted a laugh after he found a memory of an ancient Earth cartoon. Skywarp chuckled moments before Ratchet did. The rest of the group just looked mystified.

"Lot more room than you'd expect." Jazz translated.

Resonance put a hand on the trailer. It promptly disappeared, with an audible _pop _as air filled the vacuum it left behind. Then he made a face. His power plant rumbled a little louder; it would take quite a bit of energy to keep something as big as the trailer in subspace. "I think I have indigestion now."

Ratchet laughed. Optimus had never had much of a sense of humor; Resonance's was refreshingly innocent. "Next time, scan the mass as well as the dimensions, kid."

"Err, noted."

The line moved, and they shuffled forward. Skyfire was next in line to launch; the rumble of his engines as he went through his preflight check shook Ratchet's struts.

"I'm going to transform now." Resonance warned them. He stepped back several long strides, and then dropped into his alt mode. As he pulled seventy percent of his mass _out _of subspace to form his shuttle mode he displaced enough atmosphere to create a _clap _of sound nearly as loud as the disappearing porta-clinic had created earlier. A gust of wind blew across Ratchet's plating.

"Ratchet, can you make sure that trailer is secure?" Resonance asked, as he opened the exterior hatch to his cargo hold.

Ratchet clambered up the stairs and ducked into the hold. The trailer barely fit within the hold, and definitely wouldn't be leaving via the cargo hatch. Res would need to subspace it and spit it back out in root mode. He stuck his head back out and said, "Can I borrow a symbiont?"

There was no room for Ratchet to fit around it unless he slithered over the top.

Agility wordlessly scrambled down Anodyne's armor, and trotted through the doorway. The cybercat kitten skittered after him. Ratchet, well aware of Agility's elective mutism, simply said, "Help me strap this trailer down."

The tiny little mechling ducked around the trailer and caught the end of a strap when Ratchet tossed it to him. The kitten disappeared into the shadows of the cargo bay, chasing something imaginary. Working together, the two of them cranked several straps tight across the trailer.

Ratchet was struck with a strong sense of familiarity - more than once, they'd secured Optimus's command trailer in a shuttle's hold in the same fashion as they prepped for a trip. Since he often traveled with Prime, Ratchet had strapped down that trailer himself more once.

He shook it off. Resonance _was _the shuttle, and he wasn't going to miss traveling _by _small shuttle with Prime. Optimus had been patient and generally agreeable, but his large frame had not fit well within the tight confines of a small shuttle's passenger cabin. More often than not, Optimus ended up sleeping stretched out down the aisle between seats as he didn't fit in standard shuttle berths. He refused special accommodations.

Of course, laying on side on a cold floor, wedged in a narrow space between rows of seats, had not been good for Optimus's much-abused frame. Yet he had never complained.

"Looks good. Thanks, Agility." Ratchet reached into his subspace, and pulled out several crates of supplies. It took energy to keep things in subspace, and he had quite a large amount of supplies that he didn't anticipate needing immediately. "Put these on the shelves in the far corner, will you? Make sure everything's tied down tight."

Agility, without even a nod, took the crates one by one and started stashing them away. The cybercat kitten surprised Ratchet by helping Agility; she tugged at straps with her teeth, and scrambled into tight corners where even Agility couldn't reach.

Over their heads, in the passenger cabin, footsteps trotted across the floor. Quasar's voice floated down through a vent, "These seats are _small_."

"I am sorry." Resonance answered, his voice a muffled rumble. "But I had to form smaller seats due to the number of mecha I will be transporting."

Agility rolled his eyes. Much to Ratchet's shock, Agility said in a low but annoyed voice, "Resonance shouldn't be apologizing to that glitch. Quasar should be grateful. The only reason he's here is Starscream refused to come unless Resonance took his son, too."

Ratchet replied in as normal a voice as possible, "Quasar is undoubtedly upset about the disruption to his life."

He'd never heard Agility say anything so lengthy or opinionated before. He'd expected fumbled words, stuttering, or perhaps stilted grammar similar to Soundwave's. Agility sounded like any other mech. He had an Iaconian accent, and his voice was just a tad deeper than his frame size would suggest.

"What life? Nobody likes him. He has _no _friends. Even his creators _love _him, but they don't _like _him." Agility snorted. "And it's his fault."

"Quasar hasn't had a very easy life."

Agility just _looked _at Ratchet, both optics ridges rising. Ratchet had received that look from a few elders in his life, and he felt the weirdest desire to squirm in his plating, despite the fact that Agility was only a few years older than Resonance, and Ratchet was hundreds of megavorns old. Belatedly, he remembered that whatever Quasar had gone through in his short life - Quasar had been born at the very end of the war, to seekers whose parenting skills were questionable at best - Agility had lived through far, far, worse.

Ratchet held his hands up in submission. "Yeah, he's an aft, but he's young and he hasn't had much guidance in life. You - you were lucky enough to land with Soundwave."

Agility's expression softened. He nodded curtly, and then slithered under the trailer. Agility picked the kitten up, and they were both heading for the ladder up to the passenger deck when Quasar screamed, "SLAG!"

Someone smacked the outside of Resonance's hull. Jazz's voice, muffled by a couple layers of duryllium armor, shouted, "Go, go, don't worry about us! Get to earth, get help!"

"What's going on?" Ratchet barked.

"Open the door!" Quasar shouted from above their heads, even as the cargo bay hatch shut with a loud bang. "Let me out, let me out!"

Starscream broadcast on an open comm frequency, _:Quasar, shut up and fly the shuttle. Get him out of here. He's more important than any of us now!:_

"What? What happened?" Ratchet demanded.

And then the distinctive percussive _boom _of a really big blast reverberated through the shuttle's thick frame. Ratchet, well experienced in the physics of war, realized the others had seen the explosion before the sound waves had reached them.

Resonance shouted, even as his jet engines started to spin up, "Quasar, _sit down_!"

"My creators are out there!" Thumping came from above.

"And they're already in the air! Damnit, Quasar, I need _you _at my controls!"

Ratchet, horrified at the thought of Quasar flying Resonance, scrambled up the ladder towards the passenger deck. He was nearly to the top when Resonance jerked into motion. Ratchet lost his grip and tumbled back to the cargo hold's floor, crashing into the (fortunately well armored) side of his clinic trailer. Agility squeaked and darted out of his way as he thrashed his way back to his feet. The kitten disappeared.

Resonance accelerated hard, and Ratchet's quick analysis of the thrust vectors told him that the shuttle was taking off slantwise to the proper flow of traffic down the runway. Another _boom _shook the hold. Resonance's engines screamed at maximum thrust, and the G-force pinned Ratchet to the side of the trailer.

In far less distance than seemed possible for a shuttle of his size, Resonance leaped airborne. Ratchet sent a silent _thank you _in his head to Wheeljack, who really was a good engineer. And then Resonance was spiralling and spinning through the air. Ratchet was thrown hard against the ceiling, and then smashed into a bulkhead. Luck flung him into the ladder; he seized onto it. His legs peddled wildly in the air during a moment of freefall, and then he was smashed into the wall by enough gees to have turned an organic species into squished meat.

Ratchet finally managed to wrap both his arms and legs around the ladder and locked his joints. He held on for dear life, terrified, as Resonance flipped and spun and dove and wheeled.

_:Res, what the Pit is going on?: _He demanded.

_:Quasar's flying. Trying to lose them.:_

_:Lose what?:_

_:Quintesson fighters! Ratchet, they're after us!:_

Slaggit! Quintesson fighters were a match for many Seekers. It seemed impossible for a big, lumbering shuttle to outfly them. Particularly one that was unarmed and untested.

And then he realized what Resonance had said: Quasar was flying.

Pit slag, that was _worse_!

_:Your only hope is to break orbit and engage your quantum drive. Lose 'em that way.:_

_:I _know _that!: _Resonance snapped. _:Ratchet, the others are behind us! And they hit Skyfire with a missile when he launched!: _

Oh. Slag.

Two of Cybertron's last three Alpha sparks had been on that shuttle. If they were dead, then Resonance was the only possible Matrix bearer left alive. The Matrix itself would survive anything short of squishing in a black hole, but Rodimus was no war-frame ... he'd been born a civilian, and had only minimal upgrades.

Ratchet's mind whirled. Then he snarled, _:Resonance, _go_. They can take care of themselves. We need to get to Earth and get reinforcements. The humans will fight with us and we're going to need them. The fastest way to get a message to earth is for us to physically take it there.:_

_:Wheeljack ...:_

_:Wheeljack's a big boy. He can take care of himself. Your responsibility right now is to all of Cybertron. Cybertron _needs _you, kiddo.: _Ratchet clung to the ladder as Resonance accelerated into another dive. There were no windows in the cargo hold. He couldn't see precisely what was going on outside, but he had a vivid imagination. He knew they needed to get as far from the fight as possible.

"What do you _mean _you don't have guns!" Quasar shrieked from above his head.

Resonance's answer showed he'd taken Ratchet's words to heart. "Fly me into orbit or _I'll _take over. Ratchet's right. We need to get to Earth."

"But my parents ..."

"Quasar, go! Resonance is leaving his guardian behind too. Go!" Ratchet shouted.

Quasar swore something truly vile in a foreign language. They went into another steep dive. Agility yelped from somewhere behind Ratchet. At first Ratchet thought that Agility had been thrown into something, but then the little symbiont shouted, "Resonance! Let them get closer!"

"What?" Resonance said, clearly startled.

An evil, evil, grin spread across Ratchet's face. "Do it!"

"What? Why?"

"The runt has limited range!"

"Can't hurt the squids, but their fighters are sparked!" Agility added.

"_What_?" Ratchet demanded. That was news to him.

Resonance's twisting evasive flight slowed down just a little. Ratchet risked twisting around to look at Agility. The symbiont was clinging to a bulkhead like a barnacle, optics shut and mouth open in a grin that looked demented. The kitten was nowhere in sight.

Ratchet gripped the ladder just a little tighter. This wasn't going to be pleasant ...

However, when the burst of _terror-fear-destruction-death-confusion-delirium-TERROR _hit him, it was far less powerful than he was expecting. Agility had whammied him a few times when they had first rescued him from Shockwave's lab, and Ratchet had been knocked unconscious both times. This was merely unpleasant, like a bad batch of high grade coupled with a rather distracting level of terror.

"What did you _do_?" Resonance sounded awed. His flight leveled out, and he accelerated hard.

Agility was gasping through his vents. Ratchet answered for the little symbiont, "Gave 'em a hell of a bad trip. They'll be a few hours recovering, at least. Agility hit Jazz once, and it took Jazz most of a day to stop hallucinating that there were scraplets in his vents. We had to sedate him and reboot him to clear his sensory cache."

Ratchet had vivid memories of his own 'trip' courtesy of Agility's ability to scramble Cybetronian circuits with more thoroughness than a null ray. He wasn't going to discuss the matter. Jazz had bad trips; Ratchet just had colorful ones.

"Wow," Resonance said, after a moment's thought.

"Still gonna carry him around on your shoulder like a sparkling?" Ratchet asked, as he scrambled up the ladder. Agility was fast on his heels.

Simultaneously, Resonance said, "Sure, he won't hurt me," and Agility snapped, "I'd never hurt Resonance!"

Ratchet grinned - he'd expected the response from Resonance, the vocal denial from Agility was a bonus - and flung himself through the crew cabin door and into the copilot's seat. The blue sky that had shone over Iacon had been replaced by blackness and stars. They were already in orbit, and Resonance was still accelerating with every bit of his power.

"Nice flying, kids." Ratchet strapped himself in. "Agility, can Anodyne tell you what's going on in Iacon?"

Agility bit his lip and gave Quasar an uncertain glance. Then he looked squarely at Ratchet, and said, "Anodyne ... Anodyne says the Prime's dead. He says Starscream says that we need to keep Resonance safe 'cuz he's got an alpha spark."

"_What_?" Resonance demanded. "Nobody ever told me that. Ratchet, did you know that? Did Wheeljack? I know you guys scanned my spark when I was found."

Ratchet clapped a hand to his face. "Yes, we knew."

"And you never told me. _Why_?"

Quasar growled something inarticulate, and flipped several switches on Resonance's console with more force than was necessary.

"Hey, watch it." Resonance snapped at him, in a rare show of irritation. "That hurt."

"Quasar ..." Ratchet ran a hand over his face. "Be nice."

"I said," Quasar enunciated, "that Starscream's more worried about Resonance's aft than he is mine. And I'm his _child_."

"I'm sure that's not true," Resonance replied, swiftly. "Starscream told you to fly me to safety. That says he has faith in your abilities as a pilot, as well as a rather realistic opinion of my own flying skills. Quasar, I am not a skilled flier. I am trying to learn, but I don't believe my spark has natural flight coding. If I am an alpha spark, that might explain a bit."

"What do you mean, Resonance?" Ratchet felt alarm thrill through his spark.

"Agility thinks I'm a reformatted spark."

Agility said softly, "You are. I'd know."

In response, there was only silence from Resonance. He said absolutely nothing.

Awkwardly, suddenly feeling terribly guilty, Ratchet admitted, "We thought it was for the best."

"You knew I was reformatted by Shockwave. I wasn't just a vat mech. I was a reformat. _Why _did you lie to me?"

Ratchet shuttered his optics. He didn't see the starfield in front of Resonance's windshield blur to streaks and swirls as Quasar engaged Resonance's warp drive, though the weird lurching sensation was unmistakable. They were safe from Quintesson ships now.

"You are a vat mech. That has always been true." Orion Pax had been one of a batch of sixteen hundred identically framed mecha, all sparked by Vector Sigma after their protoforms had been grown in vats from cloned CNA.

"... so are many other mecha." Resonance's voice was very small.

"Vat mecha can't attend university. What a farce." Quasar said this with a sneer. "Vat mecha are created with a purpose in mind, and we need them to fulfill that purpose. We just don't have enough spare mecha alive right now for everyone to do whatever the Pit they want. Maybe someday, vatlings can have a bit more liberty, but for now - no. It's just not possible."

Ratchet sighed. "I don't agree with Quasar's opinion. Obviously."

"And then there are the vatlings with massive upgrades in their neural circuits - that's not fair to the rest of us. They blow the curve, know what I mean?" Quasar flipped a switch and tapped a display on Resonance's dash. "Pit _slag _it. That explains why you've been getting the best grades everyone's ever seen in everything but flight class - and I'm guessing the reason you suck at flying is you don't have a flier's CNA. It's all mods."

"Vat created mecha are sparked into cloned protoforms, Quasar. We know what Resonance's CNA is - it's a blend of heavy ground transport and shuttle, just as we've always told him. Resonance's processor is customized, yes, because we wanted him to have the best chance for success, but his intelligence, his curiosity, and his drive for excellence are spark deep traits."

Agility, slag the little runt, chose that moment to activate his seldom-used vocalizer. "You knew him before. He _is_ a reformat."

Ratchet rose from his seat. He had no where to flee to, but suddenly, he felt trapped. He couldn't run, there was nowhere private to go, but at least he could put some distance between himself and Agility and Quasar. He lurched out of the crew cabin, and stumbled blindly towards the back. There was a tiny stateroom with double-deck berths at the back of the passenger cabin. He lunged into the room, palmed the door shut, and collapsed into the room's only chair.

Resonance could certainly observe him, but the shuttle said nothing for several minutes. Finally, though, Resonance spoke first. "I've activated a privacy shield on the stateroom. Ratchet ... _why_? I don't understand."

"A ... friend ... of mine, also of Wheeljack's, was killed at the end of the war. His processors were destroyed, his body damaged beyond repair, but I saved his spark. We could have let him go, but ... well. Obviously, we didn't. You weren't reformatted by Shockwave. I did it. Hope you're enjoying the life we gave you, because you wouldn't exist if we hadn't made that decision."

Ratchet couldn't keep the bitterness out of his voice. Resonance would surely hate him.

They were going to go war against the Quintessons, Iacon was under attack, the Prime was dead, the entire responsibility for the mission to earth was now his, and Resonance _hated _him.

"Your friend was an alpha spark. How ... strange." Resonance sighed a long, tired, sigh. "Vector Sigma saw fit to give a vat-born mech an alpha spark. Never let it be said Primus lacks a sense of humor."

"Even when he was created, during the Golden Age, there was a stigma on batch mechs. He had to work _hard _to get a university degree, he worked his way through college while holding down a job at the docks, and that degree was just in archival science. He was so brilliant, Resonance. He could have been anything - he could have been a scientist, a physician, a great inventor or engineer or architect. Anything he wanted. Instead, he had to fight every step of the way to rise above being a mere manual laborer."

Resonance didn't say anything.

"I'm sorry, Res. Perhaps we should have told you the truth from the beginning, but we thought it best you didn't know."

"Optimus Prime. He was your friend. He died at the end of the war. He was an archivist. He was vat born."

"And he was a slagging genius." Ratchet scrubbed at his face with his hands. Resonance's voice tone told him he'd put the clues together. "I _told _Wheeljack we wouldn't be able to keep the truth from you forever. You're just too damned intuitive. Always have been. That's a spark trait, I'm sure of it."

"I ... forgive me, Ratchet. This is a lot to take in."

There was an odd noise from a wall in the room. Ratchet sat up sharply, alarm thrilling through his circuits, but it turned out to be nothing more threatening than a drone. The drone would only be knee high to the medic, if he had been standing up - it was human sized.

It was a spindly, skinny thing that was likely part of Resonance's auto-repair and maintenance systems. Unarmored, and possessing only rudimentary intelligence of its own, it could either be instructed by Resonance to perform basic tasks or controlled directly by the shuttle through a quantum link. Resonance was designed to spend long periods of time in alt mode, and if he didn't have a sparked crew aboard, he needed _some _way to work on his own systems and even handle cargo.

The drone approached Ratchet. Ratchet sat very still. Once, long ago, he'd been slugged by a shuttle's maintenance drone. He'd hit back, too. The drone was linked into the shuttle's neural net over that quantum link, and Astrotrain had felt that return blow like it had been delivered to his own dermal plating.

Resonance, to Ratchet's relief, simple put the drone's hand gently on Ratchet's knee, and then, when Ratchet didn't pull away, it clambered up his leg and then stood on his thigh and reached up and wrapped an arm around his shoulder. "Ratchet, I am not angry at you. It sounds as if you did not wish to keep the secret from me."

"No, not really. Figured it'd be futile in the long run. I was outvoted by the others. Wheeljack, Jazz, Prowl, and First Aid - the five of us were the only ones who knew for sure. I'm pretty sure Starscream's figured it out, though. Soundwave might know, but he'll keep his trap shut if he does - mech knows how and when to keep a secret, for sure. Skyfire's probably suspicious, but he's another mech who's not likely to gossip."

Skyfire could be dead. Was probably dead. Ratchet wanted nothing more than to go home and treat the wounded, to _save his friends_, but if the squids were attacking, Iacon would be a death trap right now. Agility could probably tell him more about the situation in Iacon, but he was honestly scared to ask.

The Prime was dead. The Prime had been on board Skyfire. What was Skyfire's status? He didn't know. Didn't want to know. There was nothing he could do. But not knowing was making him jittery.

"What happens now?" Resonance asked, softly.

"We go to Earth."

Resonance's drone nodded slowly in acceptance of that. Resonance said. "I ... have lived for scores of human generations in Earth's star system. I hesitate to put myself forward, because I am so young by our standards, but ... I am known to humans. I have lived among them so long I am akin to a creature of their mythology. If I ask their leaders, I believe my request will have more weight than any words you may say."

That was probably true, Ratchet reflected. Resonance had lived on Titan, with regular visits to earth, for around sixteen hundred human years. By human standards, he was no child - he was ancient.

Ratchet had been a politician, in another lifetime long ago, but he hated politics. Resonance would most likely have a natural knack for it. Optimus had. Optimus had taken to his unplanned Primacy like a seeker to flight.

"They're so fragile." Resonance sounded miserable. "The humans will come if we ask, but they will also die by the legions."

"The Quintessons will move on Earth after they conquer Cybertron. There's what, a thousand Cybertronians in Earth's system? That's the biggest population outside of Cybertron. Their goal is to subjugate us. They consider us their _property_, and escaped property at that. There are plenty of races among the galactics that agree - they see us as war machines gone rogue, and nothing more."

"The Cybertronian population is around three thousand, actually, including sparklings. Earth's a good place to raise younglings and we have an affectionate relationship with humans in general."

"How many on Titan?" Ratchet was clearly out of touch with current statistics. He had a general idea, but not specific details. He realized he needed to pick Resonance's processor for facts about Earth _before _they got there, so he would be up to speed on the big picture.

"Mostly, it was just me and Wheeljack. The domes have limited resources. We were quite useful to the humans, as we could go outside with minimal protective gear, and we could even safely carry passengers with us, but there wasn't room for more than a handful of us at one time, even in the industrial sectors. There are a few unattached symbionts living among the humans, but I didn't have much to do with them."

Ratchet ran a hand over the drone's head, then realized he was _petting a drone_ and stopped. The drone, however, pressed closer to him, holding on to him tightly. It did have dermal sensors, and Ratchet realized Resonance likely needed the "hug" - and it was pretty difficult to hug a transformed shuttle that you were inside of. What was he supposed to do, snuggle a bulkhead?

"Listen, kiddo, don't worry too much about Jackie." He rubbed the drone's back. "And I'm sorry ... I'm sorry about everything."

"You meant well." Resonance's voice clearly conveyed a frown, and there was a flare of displeasure in the shuttle's field that everyone on board would clearly feel. "Will you promise me something, Ratchet?"

"What?"

"Never hide the truth from me again. I'm not a child. I can handle it. Whatever it is."

"My friend, you have a deal."

Resonance's field still felt jagged, deeply upset. "They were bombing Iacon, Ratchet. You couldn't see it. But it looked really bad. Agility - Agility says that Anodyne's okay, but his sire was badly hurt, and so was Slamdance."

"Pit." He wished he could be there. There would be so many injured.

"I'll get us to Earth as fast as I can. It's the best thing I can do right now. But I'm so worried about everyone ..."

"Agility say anything about Ultra Magnus?"

"He survived, but he's got some nasty injuries. He's got the Matrix, but he hasn't accepted the Primacy. Prowl's in stasis lock, but they think it's just a glitch with his battle computer. Skyfire's got structural damage but nothing vital was hit."

The situation sounded better than he'd feared, but worse than he'd hoped.

_Rodimus was dead_.

He wanted to _be there. _Not here, stuck on a shuttle, away from the action, while his friends suffered and died. Prowl's battle computer was tricky to reboot under the best of circumstances. Jazz could do it, if Jazz was unhurt, and First Aid had the skills. Ratchet couldn't think of many others who he'd trust in Prowl's head.

Roddy's death also meant that, unless another alpha spark showed up, Resonance was fated to become Prime once more. And Rodimus ... Ratchet had _liked _Rodimus. He hadn't deeply respected him in the same way he had Optimus Prime, but he'd genuinely liked the young Prime. They weren't exactly friends, which was all Ratchet's fault (he knew he was a prickly aft under the best of circumstances; Rodimus didn't care for Ratchet's snarky attitude), but he'd found the kid refreshingly honest and far too young for his heavy responsibilities.

The drone's arms tightened around him. He hugged it back, despite the ridiculousness of embracing a sparkless machine.

It was going to be a long ride to Earth.


	7. Chapter 7

Reconstruction

* * *

Chapter 7

* * *

Resonance slept.

Ratchet could tell the shuttle was recharging by the even, steady pulse of his field. It was very late, or perhaps far too early in the morning, depending on how one looked at it. The medic, a veteran of too many wars, couldn't relax. Terrible scenarios filled his head.

With an aggravated growl, he got up and stalked out the state room door, through the passenger cabin, and into the flight deck.

Quasar was slumped listlessly in the pilot's seat, staring through the windshield at the otherworldly light of a transwarp field.

"I can keep watch if you want to catch some recharge," Ratchet offered the young seeker.

"Do you know how to fly?"

Ratchet arched up an optic ridge. "I'm the preferred medic for seekers all across Cybertron. I like to think I know something about flight mechanics. I've had a pilot's license since I was a youngling. And - by the way - that was some fine flying back there."

"Resonance has lousy instincts," Quasar grumbled. "And some really bad habits."

"He's used to flying with humans on board. Some of the maneuvers you pulled would have turned them to red smears on the walls." Ratchet's back struts were out of alignment following that wild ride, another reason why recharge was difficult for him. The g-forces would have been fatal to anything less sturdy than a Cybertronian. They had not been kind to aging struts, either. "Go, get some rest."

Quasar rubbed the bridge of his nose with two fingers. "I don't think I can."

"Need a sedative?" Ratchet asked. He wasn't willing to drug himself because he was the only medic and the only experienced warrior on board, but he felt it perfectly appropriate to give the kid some chemically induced recharge. Frankly, he was surprised that Resonance had managed to power down.

Quasar looked over his hand at Ratchet. "No."

Then the young seeker huffed, folded his arms across his chest, and said, "I should be on Cybertron. I'm just a grunt, doc. I'm not smart like Starscream wants me to be, and I don't have any special mods like Skywarp or Thundercracker - I don't have the spark strength to support them. But I'm a _good _fighter and I can fly almost as good as Starscream can. Better, someday, he says."

"We need a skilled pilot for Resonance. You said it yourself. That's your job, now. Starscream accepted the job because he knew it was important - you know that no matter what else anyone says about Starscream, they can't deny he cares about Cybertron and would not have been easily convinced to leave with a looming security threat."

Quasar frowned. Then he huffed a sigh, flicked his wings up, and rose. "You're probably right, doc. Doesn't mean I have to like it, though."

"I'm not real happy either, but we have a job to do."

Quasar grunted, then headed off, hopefully to recharge.

Only after he was gone did the door slid open again. Ratchet turned, expecting to see Anodyne, but it was the cybercat kitten. She was barely big enough to cover the palm of his hand, but now that he had a chance to actually scan her, he realized she wasn't a brand new sparkling. She was a few vorns old. She also looked somewhat the worse for wear, likely due to being thrown around earlier. "So, kid, what's your name?"

"Skitter." Her voice was not as high pitched as he expected.

"I'm Ratchet. C'mere and let me look at you."

She stared at him suspiciously.

"I'm a physician, kid. I just want to make sure you didn't get any injuries in that wild ride. Scary, wasn't it?"

She nodded, and let him pick her up. He set her down on his knee and scanned her more closely. She had some dents that he easily pulled out, but no major injuries. Once he was done, he absently glanced at Resonance's displays - nothing had changed, hyperwarp travel was generally dull and uneventful unless something went wrong - then reached into his subspace and found a rust stick. He broke off a piece for her, and offered it with a casual, "Here, kid."

"Thank you."

"So, you going to school yet?"

"No. There aren't any classes for symbionts open right now. But Moonlight's been teaching me lots of stuff. And Brissa lets me listen in on her classes when she goes to school."

"I see." Ratchet felt it was frankly unfair that education was being _rationed_, though he understood that all of Cybertron's resources were being stretched to the max as they attempted to rebuild. Hard decisions had been made, and some of them were truly unfair to certain segments of the population. "What's your favorite subject?"

"Language." The sparkling giggled. "Ravage says I'm a freak of nature. Cybercats aren't supposed to be chatty. But I _like _learning new languages. I've already mastered over fifty of them!"

"Any Earth languages?" That could be useful.

"Oh, yeah. Twelve! Including Terra Lingua, of course. Anodyne said he was going to Earth when he graduated college because he didn't like the way symbionts were treated on Cybertron. He was going to take me. So I wanted to learn as many as I could. I speak Quintesson, too, and Nebulan and ..."

"So you're a very smart sparkling."

"Nah, I just like to talk." She bounced a bit.

"Careful, doc. She'll wear your audials out if you let her." Agility said, from a shadowed corner of the small room.

Ratchet startled. He hadn't felt Agility's field, which was nothing new - Agility could, and did, control his EM field with surgical precision. It wasn't the first time, nor would it probably be the last, that Ratchet had been surprised by the symbiont's presence.

"Don't _do _that." Ratchet forcefully deactivated his combat protocols. He was on edge. Near death experiences tended to do that to him. He didn't need to see the sleek, deadly black Quintesson fighters to know just how close they'd come to being blown out of the sky.

Agility just looked at him. The symbiont was seated in the flight engineer's chair, curled up, knees to his chest and arms around them.

Skitter buzzed static at the older symbiont, the Cybertronian version of a raspberry. "You scared me, too, afthead."

Agility grinned at her.

"Agility, can you tell me what's going on in Iacon?"

Agility shook his head. "Not in front of the bitlet."

"Ah." Ratchet ran a hand down Flicker's back. "Flicker, why don't you keep Quasar company?"

"I'd rather she not." Agility stood up, alarm visible on his face. "I don't trust him."

Ratchet hesitated, then pinged Agility with an encryption key. They could talk over comms.

Agility rolled his optics. "Kid's better at decryption than Soundwave."

Skitter jumped down off Ratchet's knee. She fluffed and settled her thin, fragile armor, and stalked towards the door. Nose in the air, she said, "I _know _when I'm not wanted. I'm going to go patrol the hold for vermin."

"Resonance doesn't _have _vermin!" Ratchet protested, offended on behalf of the young shuttle.

The kitten looked over her shoulder at him. "But your med bay trailer does."

"Oh, _slag_." Mortified, Ratchet covered his face with both hands. When he lowered them, the sparkling was gone, and Agility was grinning at him.

"Don't worry, she's good at hunting. Poor kid lived on her own on in some ruins on the shore of the rust sea for over a vorn. She'll take care of it."

"Okay, spill. What did you not want to say in front of the kid?"

Agility held a hand up. "Skitter, I know you're listening!"

The kitten spat static at him from the far side of the thin flight deck door.

Agility shook his head. "She forgets how sensitive I am to others' fields. She's _such _a brat. If I don't kill her by the time we get to earth, it will be a miracle."

"I'm glad she was with you when we launched," Ratchet said, folding his arms. "Cybertron's no place for a symbiont sparkling right now."

Agility looked at Ratchet with wide optics, then abruptly glanced away. For a moment, Ratchet was afraid that the symbiont was going to retreat into silence in response to the mild rebuke, but Agility finally said, "Sorry. You're right. Brissa ... Brissant's _dead_."

"Anodyn's sister ... I'm sorry."

"I don't know how to tell the kid. Brissa saved her."

"I suggest honesty."

"Speaking from experience, doc?" Agility said, dryly. Then he bit his lip and looked away.

Ratchet shrugged. "Do as I say, not as I do. Anyway, the whole mess with Resonance wasn't really my doing. I wanted to tell him who and what he'd been right from the beginning. I got outvoted."

"Always took you for a tyrant, not a democrat."

"You know, runt, I liked you better when you were giving me the silent treatment."

Agility shrugged. "Res likes you. I'm not going to be rude to Res's friends."

"You really like Resonance, don't you?" Ratchet said, voice softening. Now he understood Agility's motivation for speaking to him a bit better. He was trying to look good for Resonance.

"It's unfair, too." Agility tucked his knees back to his chest.

"How so?"

"He's a shuttle and I'm a symbiont!"

"Kid," Ratchet rolled his eyes, "don't let that stop you. If you like Res, tell him."

Ratchet was surprised by the sharp stab of pain in his own spark at the suggestion. Agility would detect it too, damnitall.

Agility shook his head slowly. To Ratchet's gratitude, he didn't comment on Ratchet's own interest in the shuttle. "He's not interested in me. Not the way I am in him."

"You sure?" Ratchet asked. Resonance seemed fond of the symbiont.

"Empath, _duh_."

Most Cybertronians were empathic to a certain degree, because they could easily read each other's fields. Agility's ability to read - and manipulate - the processors of others was an order of magnitude more powerful than any normal Cybertronian. Ratchet facepalmed. "Sorry."

"Back to the subject of Iacon." Agility took a deep invent, and slowly let it out. "It's bad. Anodyne said the Prime's dead - that's confirmed. Skyfire's badly injured - Wheeljack is working with First Aid on him. Prowl and Starscream are in command, but the city defenses took a bad hit. Jazz has disappeared; Anodyne says nobody knows where he is ..."

"Doesn't mean he's dead." Ratchet smiled faintly. "Mirage missing too?"

"... yeah, according to Anodyne."

"They're off doing reconnaissance, almost certainly."

"Jazz is _scary_. His field never matches what's in his spark."

"Says the mechling without _any _field."

"I can't help it if my systems were designed by a mad scientist."

Ratchet snorted. "Can you relay a message to Anodyne for me?"

"Yeah, sure."

"Ask him not to talk to anyone but Prowl, Jazz, Wheeljack, or First Aid about Resonance's identity. There's a few other mecha who probably know, but that's all I'm sure about. As far as you go, I'll peel you out of your plating if you yack about it."

Ratchet assumed that anything Agility knew, his bondmate did. It was technically possible to keep secrets from a bondmate, but in reality, what one knew the other generally did.

"I know how to keep my mouth shut."

"Point taken." Ratchet rubbed the bridge of his nose.

"What are we going to do about Quasar?" Agility pointedly looked in the direction of the stateroom.

"Quasar will rise to the occasion. Give him a chance, kid." Ratchet said, with a surprising amount of confidence in his own words. "I've known the pissy little slagger since the day he was born."

"And I know sparks." Agility scowled fiercely. "I don't care for his. He's angry and jealous and spiteful."

"Yeah, well." Ratchet lifted a shoulder in half a shrug. "Nobody's perfect. And now let's change the subject, because we're just going to have to agree to disagree about Quasar. You said during the fight that the Quint fighters were sparked. Did you mean exactly like Cybertronian sparks, or just similar enough that you could whammy them?"

"Exactly like."

"... That's actually not a terribly huge surprise. The squids claim they created us, and it might be a bit heretical, but there's some evidence that they're telling the truth. Mind, it'll be a cold day in the Pit before I accept they _own _us, but they're an ancient race, and they have the technical ability."

"What do you mean?"

Ratchet sighed. He'd been a wartime medic for far, far, too long. Fighting Quintessons was low on his list of favorite activities. "Let's just say I have a better than average grasp of what they can do to screw us up. Their technology makes us look primitive in comparison, and they have any number of ways to manipulate sparks. Actually creating them would be well within their grasp."

Privately, he thought the only reason the squids hadn't wiped Cybertron clean of all life a long time ago was that the slagging bastards were still holding out hope of re-enslaving Cybertronians. They were both possessive and obsessive about their "property" and considered his people a valuable, escaped, asset even tens of thousands of vorns after Cybertron's last war with them.

Adding insult to injury, the galactic counsel _agreed _with the Quintessons. Many species on the counsel didn't view Cybertronians as "living" but rather as sophisticated errant robots, or, at best (and perhaps more accurately), cyborgs with nonsentient animals as their biological core.

"Protoforms." Ratchet rubbed his forehead. He didn't talk about this often, because it was considered heretical by many of his people, but he was old enough to both have seen the truth and to just not care. "Protoforms are not sentient."

"And?"

"The technology we add to protoforms to _make _them sentient is, at its core, Quintesson in design. I think what happened - and Alpha Trion agrees with me - is that the squids took a species, or probably multiple species, of silica based life forms and added ... enhancements. We are alive because our protoforms _are _living creatures, but we would be nothing more than slug-like critters oozing around Cybertron's metal core without our technological enhancements. We reproduce as a species only because we modify our offspring for sentience, starting with the carrier's nanytes in the gestation chamber, which create a spark chamber and basic frame. An unmodified protoform, cloned in a lab and allowed to develop without interference in a vat, is just a big silver slug with no higher processors and no spark."

Agility blinked at him a couple of times.

"Not what you were taught in school, was it, kid?" The "official" party line was that Primus had endowed life to Cybertron, yadda yadda yadda. Ratchet believed that there was _something _sentient at Cybertron's core, but he was deeply suspicious that it was a truly ancient artificial intelligence and not a God.

"So what are sparks?"

"I don't know. Humans sometimes believe even animals have spirits." Ratchet lifted a shoulder in half a shrug. "Percy says he can completely explain sparks with quantum science and dimensional theory and ten-space math, but he uses words that aren't even in my vocabulary when he tries to explain it."

Agility coughed air through his vents, a noise that sounded almost like a laugh. "Perceptor says I'm 'fascinating'. Anodyne had to threaten him with physical harm to get him to stop scanning me the last time we crossed paths."

"Yeah, Perceptor would love your mods." Ratchet agreed.

"I'm not going to be a lab rat ever again, thanks."

"I'm sure he didn't mean it that way."

Agility's only answer was chilly silence.

Ratchet held his hands up defensively. "Okay, okay, I get your point. But you have to realize, Percy's social skills are worse than _yours_."

Agility's silence turned to an outright glare. He slid off the chair and stalked out of the room without a word.

"Way to go." Ratchet muttered at himself, "That was brilliant, Hatchet. Piss off the one mech who knows what's happening on Cybertron ..."

* * *

Resonance woke a few hours later, and upon waking, he reflexively scanned his interior.

Ratchet was hunched over the flight controls, expression dour and field vile with a truly sour mood.

Quasar was bouncing a rubber ball against the stateroom wall. It had left scuff marks, and the sensation and noise was probably what had woken him. Resonance considered rebuking the mech, then scanned Quasar's field and realized just how miserable the young seeker was. Quasar felt desperately unhappy, with a jagged, nervous edge. He let it go.

The kitten was chasing something down in his cargo deck with vigorous enthusiasm.

Agility had found himself an out-of-the-way corner in a mechanical room below the flight deck, and was wedged in a dark corner. He had his knees drawn to his chest and was silently sobbing.

Priorities. He decided he'd investigate what had Skitter's attention later; right now, Agility looked like he needed Resonance's undivided time. The other two mecha could fend for themselves. Resonance activated the drone, which had a charging station in the same closet that Agility had chosen to hide in.

Agility jumped when the drone stepped off its charging stand. The little symbiont was a head shorter than the drone, but for a moment, Resonance feared for the drone's safety: Agility bristled like a frightened cat, armor lifting, optics flaring.

"Easy." Resonance held the drone's hands up. "Don't shoot."

"Resonance, Pit take it, you scared me." Agility let out a long, slow, exvent. "I couldn't whammy that thing anyway, it has no spark. Didn't know you had a drone."

"It comes in handy sometimes." He stepped closer, pushing more of his awareness into the drone's senses as he did. It was strange looking at Agility from only a foot taller. "You were crying."

"Yeah." Agility looked sharply away. "Didn't want anyone to know."

"Well, I know." Resonance held his arms open, inviting a hug.

Agility hesitated for a long moment, then threw himself into the drone's arms. Resonance tightened his grip and held the symbiont close. "Is it what's going on in Iacon?"

The symbiont shook his head no, but then he said, "Anodyne's sister's dead. Lots of people hurt. Anodyne's so scared. The city's being bombed really bad. Scout's hiding in the mines under the city - she can't get to Anodyne because of the bombing. 'Dyne's with the resistance, and they're talking about having him bond not just with Slamdance but with two symbionts I don't even _know _because they're fliers and it would give the resistance an advantage to have another carrier with eyes ... eyes in the s-sky. But I've never even _met _them."

"I'm sorry." It's all he could say.

"And I'm scared for you." Agility whispered, almost inaudibly.

"What?" Resonance was surprised by that.

"If they make you take the Matrix, it will _change _you."

"We don't need to worry about that right now." Resonance stroked Agility's back soothingly. "And even if I do ... I do become Prime ... again, I guess ... we'll still be friends. I promise."

"Don't make promises you can't keep." Agility tried to push away from the drone. His tone was bitter. "You'd never have time for me."

"I'd _make _time for you."

"Slag." Agility scowled at the drone's hominid features. "You become Prime, _everyone _will want to be your friend. You gonna make time for all of them? What's so special about me that I'd deserve more than anyone else?"

Resonance could only shrug the drone's shoulders. "I like you."

"You barely _know _me." Agility tried again to get free. "Been tryin' pretty hard to be likeable, too. Guess it worked."

Resonance let Agility go. The little symbiont scrambled across the room, jumped up, slapped the switch to open the door, and exited in a huff.

Resonance sighed through the drone's mouth, and wrapped its arms around its knees. Perhaps he should have been offended, but Agility's field had radiated nothing but fear, anxiety, and anger. After a moment, he stood the drone up and left the machine room. His internal sensors told him that Agility had found a new hiding place in a ventilation duct. He could have followed, but he decided to let Agility calm down a bit first.

Next up on his priority list was Quasar, who was throwing the ball with increasing force against the stateroom walls.

Quasar jumped when the stateroom door slid open. The ball went wild, and Resonance's drone neatly caught it. Quasar bristled, armor flaring. "What the slag ... where did _you _come from?"

"A closet." Resonance replied, with one optic ridge quirked up. "Please don't bounce balls off the walls. It is irritating."

Quasar visibly deflated. "You're Resonance's drone."

"This is my drone, yes." Resonance tossed the ball back to Quasar. "Next time, I will keep the ball."

Quasar grunted, and subspaced the ball.

Resonance sighed. "I know you're worried about your creators, Quasar. I empathize."

"What would you know about creators? You were made in a _vat_." The seeker spat this with his wings raised as high as the low ceiling would allow. "You can barely _fly_. You're incompetent as a flier, and the only reason you got into the university, and the only reason my carrier cares what happens to you, is that you were Optimus-slagging-_Prime_ in a past life."

"I'm reasonably sure, based on the historical accounts that I've read, that Optimus Prime was no friend to Starscream." Resonance said this mildly, but his drone crossed its arms across his chest. The robot's large optics narrowed, and its mouth pressed into a thin, annoyed, line.

"Yeah? Well, they care more about _you _than they care about _me_." Quasar spun about, turning his back on the drone.

"What makes you say that?" Resonance's sigh rattled through the entire craft. "I'd say that they care about you a great deal - and I would also note that Starscream has a tremendous amount of faith in your skills as a pilot."

"Bah. I was the only choice."

"No. You weren't. Ratchet _does _know how to fly. He has to have good technical knowledge of flight systems to be certified as a flight frame physician, and he most certainly is. That takes years of study of _flight_, including thousands of hours of flying time as a pilot. He is megavorns old, and has enough knowledge that he has helped _design _flight frames. Yet I would note that it was _you _that Starscream ordered to take my controls. Not Ratchet."

"I'm a seeker. I can fly anything." Quasar lifted a shoulder and a wing in half a shrug.

"Yes." The drone stepped forward, reached way up, and rested a hand on Quasar's arm. "You can. And Starscream knows that. Starscream is many things, some of them unpleasant and distasteful, but no one has ever accused him of being disloyal to Cybertron. He cares about the fate of our world, and its people. It is why Primus called him to be Air Commander. It is why he fought so hard, against both Prime and Megatron, to see a better future for our world. And he asked _you _to see that I got to Earth, because this mission is vital for Cybertron's future."

Quasar looked down at the drone, expression unreadable.

"Quasar, this mission is critical, and I need your help."

The seeker turned back to face the drone. He crouched, so he could meet the drone's optics. "Nobody has _ever _needed my help before. I'm just Starscream's unwanted brat."

"I want you here." Resonance's drone smiled. He reached up and rested a hand on the seeker's shoulder. "And I needed you, and will need you again."

"Okay." Quasar sighed. "For Cybertron, I'll help you."

"Thank you." The drone squeezed his shoulder with a surprisingly powerful grip. "Now, if you'll go relieve Ratchet, I want to go see what the sparkling is up to. She's chasing something in my hold and whatever it is _tickles_."

Alarm crossed Quasar's face. "You better not have vermin."

"Not so far as I know." Resonance grinned. "I'll keep you up to date."

* * *

Resonance's drone scrambled nimbly down the ladder into his own hold. Ratchet had found the space tight, but the drone was small enough to find it rather spacious even with a medical trailer parked in the middle of the space, and the walls lined with shelves of energon cubes, parts, and supplies.

The kitten scampered out from under the trailer.

"Hi!" She stopped short.

"Hello, Skitter."

"No spark." She stared at the drone suspiciously.

"Yeah, this is my - Resonance's - maintenance drone."

"Ah, okay."

"What are you chasing?"

"Glitchmice!"

"_What_?" Resonance's reaction was loud enough that everyone on the shuttle had to have heard it.

"Well, glitchmouse." She pointed with a paw to a dark corner of the hold. "Killed the other two already."

"_Thank _you."

"It was fun."

"Can't get the last one. It's hiding."

"Where is it?" Resonance demanded. How had he picked up glitchmice? He showered with solvent regularly, he hadn't recharged anywhere with dubious sanitation, and he didn't think any of his friends had vermin.

"Trailer had pests." She pointed at Ratchet's portable med bay. "I took care of it. Except for one. You move the grate, I'll get it."

"Ah ... yes, show me where." He needed to have a _discussion _with Ratchet. The doctor really should have checked the trailer before bringing it on board. Glitchmice were drawn to electricity, so if the trailer had been plugged in to keep its batteries topped off, they certainly could have infested it while it was in storage.

The kitten trotted ahead of the drone, and led him around the trailer to the very back of his cargo hold. There was a grate in the floor, with a hole chewed through the metal that was big enough for a glitchmouse but not the kitten. Resonance swore under his breath, then lifted the grate up with the drone.

The grate was the access hatch to his spinal struts and associated neural circuits. A glitchmouse in there was _bad _news. It wouldn't do permanent damage, but it could cause temporary paralysis of random body parts (or weapons, if he had any frame mounted weaponry) when it latched onto a neural wire to recharge.

"I'll get it." She bounded down into the narrow space.

He leaned the drone over the edge, and peered down the access tube. Bemused, he watched as the kitten stalked, pounced on, and efficiently killed the glitchmouse. She shook it with her jaws a couple of times to verify it was dead, then scrambled back out and dropped the ugly, toothy, scaled creature at his feet. Its long, skinny, whiplike tail was still twitching.

"All dead."

"You sure?"

"Yup."

"Thank you." He reached down and started to pick her up with the drone, and then hesitated. Symbionts were not animals, and sparklings of any frame type didn't always appreciate being picked up by strangers. However, she saw the motion and promptly leaped into his arms. She made a large, surprisingly heavy, armful. Humans would compare her to a large dog in size.

The kitten buried her face in the crook of the drone's neck. Softly, she said, "Brissa's dead."

"I'm sorry. I heard."

The kitten whimpered.

He slid down to sit against the wall and wrapped the drone's arms tightly around her. "I'm so sorry, my friend."

"I'm all alone here 'cept for Agility, an' he's got _issues_."

"No. You're not alone." He reached down to tilt her chin up, and looked her in the eyes. "You're with me. And I will take care of you until I can return you to Soundwave's family. I promise."

"You'll take care of Agility too?"

"Of course."

"Agility's a brat. Soundwave says he's part of my clan, though, so I guess I love him." She leaned her head against his chest. "And I'll kill _any _glitchmice that get in your systems."

"Thank you," he said, gravely. "I appreciate the courtesy."

"Killing glitchmice is _fun_."

* * *

Resonance's drone stayed with Skitter until she dropped off into a restless recharge. Then, when she was finally asleep, he emptied random spare parts out a storage bin, lined the storage bin with a blanket he produced from his subspace, and set her down to sleep in the box.

Briefly, he stroked the blanket with the drone's fingers, remembering the human child who he had once loved as if she was his own, who had once slept with it on her bed. It was the only soft fabric he owned that wasn't his drone's limited wardrobe of human-style clothing, however, and he was certain Emily would have approved and even scolded him had he not given it to Skitter.

He tucked the box into a far corner of his hold, behind a pile of energon cubes, where there was room for both his drone and the kitten. Of all the crew, Skitter was by far the most vulnerable and the youngest. He wanted to give her a place where she would feel safe and secure from the tempestuous temperaments of both Ratchet and Quasar.

Once he was certain Skitter would remain in recharge at least for a little while, he rose from beside the box and went to find Ratchet.

The medic was in the state room, having traded off with Quasar. Ratchet was staring gloomily at a wall, arms folded across his chest, mouth set into a hard line. Resonance watched him over his internal sensors for a moment before entering the room with the drone.

Ratchet lifted an optic ridge. "You're pretty comfortable with that drone."

Resonance let out a sigh through the drone's vents. "I've spent more of my life looking through the drone's optics than my own, to be perfectly honest. It's more practical around humans."

Ratchet scanned the drone, then grunted. "And it's fully functional with humans, I see. You integrated well with them, I take it?"

"I was married three times to humans." He had not mentioned this to anyone on Cybertron because of the scandal it would create. Interspecies romance wasn't taboo, but long term bonds with any species were strongly discouraged before a mech reached their legal majority and full growth.

"You're a minor." Ratchet said, sounding surprised.

"By Cybertronian standards." He leaned against a wall, and watched Ratchet for a long, quiet moment. He didn't know how Ratchet was going to react, but odds were, Ratchet would meet some of his human family members when they reached Earth's system. He might as well tell them now.

Ratchet snorted a bitter laugh and ran a hand over his face. "We're so screwed up as a race. That symbiont kitten is more mentally and emotionally mature than a lot of humans who are considered fully adults. She's older than the normal full lifespan of a human, too. By the time most mecha are a vorn or two old, they could easily be emancipated, particularly if they were vat grown to physical maturity."

The drone shrugged. "It's expensive to create a mech in a vat, and even more expensive to raise a primally created mech to physical adulthood given the upgrades needed. I believe, after considerable study, the Cybertronian concept of 'adulthood' has its roots in a form of indentured servitude. Many - perhaps even most - mecha do not create sparklings out of a desire to procreate. They need soldiers, laborers, miners, and what humans would call blue-collar workers. If a mine owner, for example, spent the equivalent of several vorns' average wages to create a sparkling to work in a mine and the sparkling ran off half a vorn later to go pursue a different career ... what incentive would the mine owner have to create more sparklings? It would be a money losing proposition, and that lack of incentive would severely limit our rate of population growth"

Ratchet eyed him. The drone stared blandly back.

"Primus." Ratchet rubbed the bridge of his nose with two fingers. "And it's easy enough to justify twenty-one vorns of slavery disguised as 'childhood' when we live many megavorns."

"You see the injustice in this system as well as I do, then. As well as the lack of _socialization _that negatively affects many of our younglings."

"Yeah, I do. There's a lot of things I don't like about our culture. Humans aren't perfect but I've always admired how they handle procreation and child rearing." Ratchet leaned back on the berth, shoulders to the wall. Through the dermal sensors in the wall, Resonance could feel the low thrum of Ratchet's large power plant. "You know, Optimus and I used to have discussions like this."

"I'm sorry if it unnerves you."

"No ... no, it doesn't, actually." Ratchet shut his optics off. "You're not him. It's getting easier and easier to see _you _without remembering _him._"

Resonance walked across the small room and scrambled up onto the berth. He sat down, crosslegged, next to Ratchet. "I imagine this form helps with that."

Ratchet barked a laugh at Resonance's dry humor. "Not really. Optimus had Roller. He'd be busy with official business in one part of Iacon, and hanging out in my med bay at the same time. I miss that, quite honestly. Most people just thought I had an AI robot as a buddy. They never realized that it was actually a drone, and the mech looking through its optics was Prime himself."

"I've never named the drone. It _is _me, in many ways." Resonance joined Ratchet in leaning against the wall. "Pit, I'm tired."

"You could recharge more."

"Not that kind of tired." Resonance smiled a bit wryly, and then proceeded to give Ratchet a blow-by-blow account of his interaction with both Agility and Quasar. He concluded, "I think the high point today was hunting glitchmice in my hold with Skitter - and, by the way, that's _your _fault. You ever bring anything with glitchmice aboard me again, and I'm kicking you out to walk home."

Ratchet laughed at that. "Sorry, kid. That trailer's been in storage forever. I should have checked it out, but we didn't exactly have time."

"Ratchet, do you think Agility and Quasar will be okay?"

"Quasar ... needs someone in his life who has faith in him." Ratchet picked at a bit of scratched paint on his forearm. "Starscream and Skywarp haven't exactly been exemplary parents."

"How did that happen, anyway?" Resonance wrinkled his nose up. "Skywarp doesn't seem like Starscream's type."

"From what I understand, neither of them _remember _what happened. Substantial high grade was involved. Quasar was an accident, and neither seeker wanted to be a parent. Nor do they love one another. They've tried, to their credit, but Quasar knows he wasn't wanted and, worse, his personality clashes with them."

"Poor kid."

"That kid's older than you."

"Well, not technically."

Ratchet snorted. "You're never going to let me forget that, are you?"

Resonance flashed him a tired grin. "Either you laugh or you cry. Wheeljack taught me that one."

"Hey, kid, don't worry too much about Jackie. He's a smart old mech, and tough as they come." Ratchet reached out and cautiously put a hand on the drone's shoulder.

Resonance's drone leaned into his hand, and then slowly melted into Ratchet's side. Ratchet squeezed him tight, even as his spark did a crazy fluttering dance in his chest. Optimus had never sought this sort of comfort from him, and Ratchet wasn't really the sort to initiate hugs - a squeeze on the arm was always as far as he'd dared go with Optimus, even though they'd been the closest of friends. It felt strangely satisfying, in a purely platonic way, to hold the young mech to his chest. That he was technically snuggling a drone didn't matter; Resonance would feel the embrace just like it have been given to his root mode.

"I know, but I always worry about him." Resonance said, voice very low. "But there's nothing I can do for him. I can help the others, now, though. Quasar needs to feel wanted, and I can give him that, easily. I _do _need him. Agility ... I don't know what to do with Agility."

"Neither do I. Rung and Soundwave both say he needs to feel in control of something, or have someone absolutely in control of _him,_ or he goes off the rails ... I would suggest that we find him a job of some sort to keep his mind busy."

"Like what?"

"I don't know."

Resonance nodded slowly. "He's a good mech."

"Yes, he is. And you're good with him. Resonance - you do realize he has a crush on you?"

"What?" Resonance stiffened. "No, I didn't."

"Figured that was the case. Optimus was always clueless about such things too."

"I just wanted to be his friend, not mislead him on my interests ..."

"If you _are _interested in him, I can give you some tips on how to work around the size difference ..." Ratchet sounded miserably awkward when he said this. He wasn't keen on directing Resonance towards Agility, for reasons he didn't want to examine too closely, but he _was _a physician.

Resonance, bemused, observed, "I've been married to three separate humans. This drone is fully functional. I think I can figure the mechanics out, if it came to that."

Ratchet grunted, hiding his own angst with a bland, "I suppose so."

"Agility's not really my type, though." Resonance said, to Ratchet's surprise and no little anxiety. In some ways, it would be easier for Ratchet to deal with his own emotions if Resonance had a partner. "I've done the 'rescuing someone from themselves' relationship _once_. It didn't work then, and the reason it didn't work was that I was just too close to the problem. For both our sakes, I wouldn't consider anything with Agility until he's got his problems sorted out ... and even then, he's still not really my type."

Ratchet wondered what Resonance's type was. Given the fact that he'd been involved with three humans in this life, and had a close platonic relationship with Elita in his past life, he suspected _short _was among the qualifications. Shorter than a certain medic, certainly. "- I can't believe you've had partners. Optimus ... Optimus never did."

"Ever? What about Elita-one?"

"They were close." Ratchet scrubbed at his face with his free hand. The other was wrapped around the drone. "But the Matrix claimed him before they could do more than court. They grew up together and were close friends, but nothing more. Once he became Prime, Optimus ... refused to take a partner. He said he couldn't show favoritism to one mech over any others."

He remembered how bitterly disappointed Elita had been by that decision.

Resonance was silent for a long, quiet, moment. "I can understand that logic, but I believe that choice was made by a mech no older than I am now, with far less life experience. To be perfectly honest, I'm a better mech for the relationships I've had. I'm stronger when I have a partner who compliments my weaknesses. I can't see myself making the same choice."

"I ... tried to tell Optimus that." Ratchet looked down at the drone in his arms in surprise. "He never understood. I'm glad you've had the opportunity to have that sort of relationship _before _the Matrix claims you."

"You sound sure I'll be Prime. What if it refuses me?" Resonance looked up at him with the drone's large blue optics.

Ratchet snorted. "Then Primus help Cybertron, because we'll be without a Prime in a time of war."

"So I suppose the plan is for us to ask the humans for help, then for me to get my tailfins back to Cybertron." Resonance rubbed the bridge of the drone's nose with two fingers in a gesture that was achingly familiar; Optimus had similarly rubbed his face when he was emotionally exhausted.

Ratchet shook his head. "As soon as Skyfire's flight worthy, he'll bring the Matrix to you. A return trip to Cybertron would be too dangerous for you, with your flight skills."

"... Or lack thereof." Resonance mused. "This was planned ahead of time?"

"Prowl and Jazz had a contingency plan where if anything happened to Roddy ..." for a moment, his vocalizer stalled. He'd _liked _the young Prime, who was no Optimus, but who had tried so very hard, "... and there wasn't another candidate on Cybertron, someone would be sent to find you."

"So when we get to Earth's system, we sit tight and wait."

"Unless we hear different from Anodyne, yeah."

Resonance nodded slowly. "It won't be easy to wait. I want to go _help._"

"Would you like my advice?"

"Certainly."

"Once we get to Earth, practice your flight skills with Quasar. He knows what he's doing in the air. He's very nearly as good as Starscream. He's never been tested in battle, but he's got all the technical knowledge he needs and he's been practicing combat scenarios in the air since he was less than a vorn old. You'll need to know everything he can teach you."

"I'll do that."

Ratchet realized that, somehow, he had started stroking the drone's back without even realizing it. His hand stilled. Resonance asked softly, "What's wrong?"

Ratchet had no idea how to answer that, or what to do. He was never a physically affectionate mech. He didn't _do _cuddling. Even holding young sparklings made him uneasy. Optimus had, by contrast, been touchy-feely, but he'd always respected Ratchet's boundaries.

"Nothing." Ratchet said, after a moment. He lowered his hand to Resonance's drone's shoulders. "Everything."

Resonance's drone lay against his chest, a light but warm weight. "The others - I don't know about them. They may rise to the occasion, or not. However, I can _trust _you. That is very important to me, and to our mission."

He didn't know what to say, so he simply grunted something that he hoped Resonance would take as agreement.

"You should get some recharge, my friend." Resonance's drone reached up and patted him on one pauldron. "I'll let you rest."

"... Stay." He said, impulsively, and then immediately regretted the words. He was overstepping his bounds. Resonance was so young, and he would also, almost certainly, be Prime again.

"If it will help you recharge."

He couldn't imagine recharging with an armful of Resonance, regardless if it was the drone of the young mech or his actual root mode. He scrambled mentally for an idea and then said, "Could ... my back struts are out of alignment. Do you think you could work on them?"

"Oh. Certainly." The drone stood on on the berth next to Ratchet then gestured casually. "Lay down."

The drone's fingers were nimble, and Resonance's touch was skilled and strictly platonic. It was soothing, somehow, in a way that he hadn't expected. First he found himself relaxing ... and then, slowly, drifting into recharge. His last conscious awareness was of the drone's small, nimble, fingers tightening a stretched tension wire in his neck, and of the warm feel of Resonance's steady and calm sparkfield all around him.


End file.
